
JAWooD 




Book , V' „: i>- . 

Copyright N° 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 




JOHN ALLEN WOOD. 



Sunset Echoes 



By 
REV. J. A. WOOD 



Author of "Perfect Love" "Purity and Maturity," 
"Wesley on Perfection." 




The Christian Witness Company 

chicago and boston 

1904 



I LIBRARY of OOMaRESS 
I Two Gopies Keceived 

DEC 27 I9U4 

I GUSS <3t- XXc, ^io: 
COPY Q. 



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:ST7G7 



Copyright, 1904. 
THE CHRISTIAN WITNESS CO. 



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PREFACE 

In this little volume I present a series of articles writ- 
ten for various religious papers during years past ; in this 
way giving them a more permanent form, and putting 
them where they may reach some who have never seen 
them. As it is not given to any man to know everything, 
I believe it wise for men to confine themselves largely to 
mastering the truths relating to their profession or life 
work. 

My reading, thinking and writing during the past fifty 
years have been confined largely to evangelical truth, as 
related to the teaching and work of the Gospel minister. 
I make no claim to originality, and have no speculative, or 
novel notions ; but have studiously sought to gather truth 
from every available source, and wherever I have found 
a clear, strong, important truth I have made it my own ; 
and have thus filled my mind with Gospel truth, and in- 
corporated it into my writings and preaching. 

The reader may find some repetition in some of the 
articles, and may have seen some of them, or parts of 
themi in various periodicals for which I have written. I 
trust the sentiments, principles and doctrines presented 
will be found helpful and useful. That they may do good 
and no harm is my prayer in giving them this book form. 

JOHN A. WOOD. 
South Pasadena, Calif., Dec. 14, 1904. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



Entire Sanctification 7 

Backsliding from Entire Sanctification 12 

Divine Manifestations 17 

On to Holiness or Back to Perdition 21 

Blow tlie Trumpet Long and Loud 25 

Why Do So Many Lose Perfect Love? 29 

From Glory to Glory 32 

The Personality and Divinity of the Holy Sprit 36 

Do All to the Glory of God 40 

Christian Assurance 43 

Scriptural Asking 46 

Holiness in the Life 50 

Perfection 53 

The Turpitude of Sin 57 

Sins of Omission 65 

Death Does Not Sanctify the Soul 68 

Conscience and Duty 71 

A Baptism of Love 73 

The Rest of Faith 76 

Divine Visitations 80 

Walking Alone w^ith Jesus 83 

The Christian Pastor's Responsibility 86 

Have Any of the Rulers Believed on Him ? 89 

The Death of Saints 94 

Ministers Need the Holy Spirit 96 

The Vine with Its Branches 99 

The Bliss of the Purified 102 

The Joy of Salvation 106 



Regeneration with Its Concomitants 110 

Some Entirely Sanctified in All Denominations 113 

Holiness Is Religion Made Easy 115 

Why God Delays Answer to Prayer 117 

The Blessedness of Purity 119 

How to Preach Well 122 

The Self Perpetuating Power of Sin 125 

The Sword of the Lord and Gideon 128 

The Atonement 131 

Holiness to the Lord 133 

Sanctification Through the Truth 136 

Charity and Humility 140 

Reasons Why More Are Not Entirely Sanctified 144 

Needless Singularities 147 

Sinless Perfection 150 

Mistakes Regarding Entire Sanctification 153 

Entire Sanctification Distinct from Justification and Re- 
generation 155 

The Holiness and Happiness of All Men 158 



ENTIRE SANCTIFICATION. 

By Rev. J. A. Wood. 

I do not intend, or assume to be an umpire on the 
subject of this article. I would write less on the 
subject, and give it less attention if others would write 
more, and give the doctrine and experience the atten- 
tion its interest and prominence demand. It is the ''cen- 
tral idea'* of Christianity and as such is every way iden- 
tified with the church of God and human salvation. 

The word ''sanctification'' is quite common in both 
the Old and New Testament Scriptures. It, with its 
derivatives, occurs over one hundred times, and gener- 
ally is expressive of Christian character. Very few words 
expressive of Qiristian experience occur as often in 
God's word ; and being given by inspiration, it has divine 
sanction. 

The doctrine of Christian sanctification is held as a 
cardinal truth by the whole church, both Protestant and 
Catholic. In some form it is associated with every lead- 
ing creed in the Christian world. The church differs as 
to some particulars regarding it; these differences relate 
to its time, its extent, and somewhat to the conditions of 
the work. All agree that entire sanctification must ex- 
clude all that is sinful or morally wrong. The church 



8 SUNSET ECHOES 

differs to some extent as to what is sinful ; some holding 
that only sinful acts are sinful, while others claim that 
sinful states involve guilt. 

The authorized views of the Methodist Episcopal 
Church are not extreme, but midway between, high Cal- 
vinism on the one side, and low Zenzendiovianism on 
the other. Our ground is medium, or middle ground. 
Truth is almost invariably found between extremes ; this 
is true not only theoretically, but practically and experi- 
mentally. 

High Calvinism on this subject is taught in the West- 
minster Confession of Faith, which is the dottrinal basis 
of the Presbyterian Church. In it we are taught : — 'This 
sanctification is throughout the whole man, yet imper- 
fect in this life, there abide still some rermnants of cor- 
ruption in every part, whence ariseth a continual and 
irreconcilable war, the flesh lusting against the spirit and 
the spirit against the flesh.'' 

The low Zinzendovian view is found in the writings 
of Count Zinzendorf, in ''Holiness the Birthright of all 
God's children," as held and given by Dr. Crane, and by 
Prof. Fairchild, of Oberlin College. This view is pre- 
sented by Dr. J. F. Crane in his article in McClintock & 
Strong's Biblical Cyclopedia, as follows : 'Tn the re- 
newal of the soul at conversion whereby man becomes a 
new creature, a new man, which after God is created in 
righteousness and true holiness, the inborn moral de- 



ENTIRE SANCTIFICATION 9 

pravity is removed from the immortal nature, which so 
far as the work of cleansing is concerned, is in that mo- 
ment fitted for heaven itself/' 

The Arminean, or Wesleyan doctrine occupies the 
happy medium between these extreme views; it is given 
in McClintock & Strong's, as follows: ist. 'That man 
by nature is depraved, so that aside from grace, he is 
unfitted for all good, and prone to all evil.'' 

2d. ''That, through the grace of God, this moral de- 
pravity may be removed in this life and man may live 
freed from it." 

3d. "That regeneration begins the process of cleans- 
ing ; but except in some exempt cases possibly does not 
complete it, a degree of depravity still remaining in the 
regenerate." 

4th. "That the process of cleansing is in some cases 
gradual, the remains of evil nature wearing away by 
degrees; in others instantaneous, the believer receiving 
the blessing of a clean heart a few days, or even hours, 
after his regeneration." 

5th. "That this great gift is to be sought for specifi- 
cally, and is to be obtained by a special act of faith di- 
rected towards this very object." 

6th. "That this second attainment is attested by the 
Holy Spirit, which witnesses to the completion of the 
cleansing, as it did to the regeneration which began it." 

7th. "That this gracious attainment, thus attested by 



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ENTIRE SANCTIFICATION II 

Illumination, conviction and assisting grace, and cleans- 
ing power are divine — God's work. 

We avoid extreme views as to the guiltiness and na- 
ture of depravity. Some hold that there is damning guilt 
in depraved inclinations, while others hold that there is 
no moral guilt in depravity, and that guilt can be asserted 
only of sinful actions. The Methodist view is, that sin- 
ful acts alone involve guilt and need pardon, and that 
depraved states have moral quality, and hence need 
cleansing. We avoid confounding sinful acts and sin- 
ful states, that which needs pardon, with that which needs 
cleansing. 

The agreements of the Christian Church on this sub- 
ject, are however, more than their disagreements. All 
schools of theology agree, that the complete sanctification 
of believers is an essential part of the plan of salvation. 
All agree in pronouncing sin as a thing to be abhorred, 
repented of, and forgiven ; and depravity a defilement of 
nature from which God's people must be delivered be- 
fore they can enter heaven. All agree that the true fol- 
lowers of Christ hate sin, loatlie it, resist it, turn away 
from it, and seek deliverance from it. All sensible Chris- 
tians agree that no man can attain absolute perfection in 
any respect, at any time, or in any thing. 



12 SUNSET ECHOES 



BACKSLIDING FROM ENTIRE SANCTIFICA-- 

TION. 

No state of grace in this life excludes exposure from 
loss, or liability to backslide and apostatize. It is not 
uncommon for those entirely sanctified to lose ground and 
find themselves in part, or wholly blackslidden. There is 
no necessity for this, and it certainly ought not to be. 

Blacksliding is a matter of degrees, whether from en- 
tire sanctification or from justification. It may be slight 
and partial in either case, or it may be entire — ^ruinous 
apostasy. Christ, after commending many things in 
some, said, ''Nevertheless I have somewhat against thee.'' 
Of others, it is said they made shipwreck of faith and 
of a good conscience. Such is the relation of faith to 
salvation, that when the soul makes shipwreck of it, 
piety goes overboard with it. 

Not every degree of backsliding forfeits either jus- 
tification or entire sanctification. There may be some 
loss in either state without a forfeiture of all grace, or a 
gracious condition. There is, not unfrequently, some lit- 
tle remissnesses, both in things omitted or committed, 
which tend to darken our light, weaken our strength, 
lessen our spiritual life, and render uncertain our assur- 
ance of divine favor; which do not plunge the soul at 
once into condemnation and death. These should be 



BACKSLIDING FROM ENTIRE SANCTIFICATION I3 

avoided as injurious and tending to utter apostasy. They 
are sudi as occasionally vain and useless thoughts, need- 
less, idle words, little portions of misspent time, brief 
seasons of hesitancy in confessing Christ, slight remis- 
sions in prayer, or in reading the Bible, slackness at 
times, little self-indulgences, such as occasionally over- 
eating or lying in bed longer than is needful or health- 
ful, and over-indulgence in the lawful physical appetites, 
unnecessary lightness mixed with seeming irreverence 
and carelessness. I do not mean the habitual and worst 
form of these things ; but as slight and occasional items. 
These, with many other like things, while they do not 
plunge the soul instantly into condemnation, do darken 
and weaken it, interrupt its communion with God, and 
gradually sink it into a doubtful and partially blackslid- 
den state. 

In this way most of the backsliding occurs with those 
entirely sanctified ; a remissness in little things, and a fall 
little by little. I call these items little things because 
they are relatively so in a comparative sense, and are 
along the line of things questionable and unquestionable. 
We are aware there is an important sense in which they 
are not little, and that with God nothing is either little of 
are not little, and that with God nothing is either little or 
great. ''He that is unfaithful in that which is least, is also 
unfaithful in that which is much.'' 

It is often asked, Can a believer backslide fromi a 



14 SUNSET ECHOES 

state of entire sanctification, and yet retain a justified 
state? That will depend upon how he backslides, and 
how far he backslides. When a man backslides by any 
voluntary known sin, properly so-called, he forfeits both 
entire sanctification and justification, and lays the founda- 
tion for repentance, confession and pardon, without which 
he will be damned just as any other unrepenting sinner. 
'*He that commiteth sin is of the devil," no matter what 
he possessed, professed or was before. 

Every degree of backsliding, however, does not in- 
volve the loss of justification. A person walking in the 
light of purity, may, by almost imperceptible degrees, 
through various causes, lose his hold on Christ and the 
keeping spirit, and gradually lose the clear light of purity 
and still not forfeit his sonship as a child of God. Both 
pardon and purity are retained, as well as obtained, by 
faith, and we can maintain the light of purity only by the 
faith on which it is conditioned. 

After justification and regeneration, when we were 
entirely sanctified, we received simply and only full spir- 
itual cleansing; hence, the loss of what we received at 
that time would be the loss of purity only, and not of 
justification. As there are stages in the reception of sal- 
vation, it is reasonable to believe there may be stages in 
its loss. 

'^The just shall live by faith.'^ 'We stand by faith." 
"According to your faith be it unto you.'' There is a 



BACKSLIDING FROM ENTIRE SANCTIFICATION I5 

gradation in the scale of faith ; there being ' Veak faith" 
and ''strong faith/' 'little faith'' and "great faith," and 
an "increase of faith." If there be an increase of faith, 
there may be also a decrease of faith, and a man may de- 
scend from "great faith" to "little faith" without a total 
loss of the principle of saving faith. We may backslide 
in a degree without backsliding totally, so as to be under 
the dominion of Satan. A believer may lose some ground 
without going over fully on to the devil's ground. 

To suffer a decreasing light and a corresponding 
weakening evidence of God's favor, while under divine 
diastisemxcnt for little remissnesses, does not imply a for- 
feiture of heirship and all saving relations to Christ. A 
knowledge by the witnessing Spirit, of our acceptance 
wdth God, is not necessary in order to acceptance, of a 
state of either justification or sanctification. And yet, 
it is evident that the light of justification, after the loss 
of entire sanctification from any cause is less clear and 
assuring, and admits of more doubt and dissatisfaction; 
and usually restoration or apostasy is the alternative. 

The difference between the regenerate and justified, 
and the entire sanctified, is in one possessing indwelling 
sin, and the other cleansed therefrom. It must be admit- 
ted that indwelling sin, a conscious sinful proclivity (sin- 
ful in nature and not in indulgence) does not involve the 
loss of justification, though it may lead to its loss. If 
this were so, all regenerated, but not entirely sanctified 



l6 SUNSET ECHOES 

souls, could not be in a state of justification. This sin- 
ful inclination, whether felt or otherwise, is inconsistent 
with purity of heart. 

Mr. Wesley taught that entire sanctification might 
be lost without the loss of all saving relation, to Christ. 
He says, in speaking of backsliders from entire sancti- 
fication: ''Sometimes suddenly, but oftener by slow de- 
grees, they have yielded to temptation; and pride, or 
anger, or foolish desires have again sprung up in their 
hearts. Nay, sometimes they have utterly lost the life 
of God and sin hath reigned in dominion over them." 
Sermons, Vol. II, page 247. 'The rest had suffered loss, 
more or less, and two or three were shorn of all their 
strength,'' Journal, 1763. "On a close examination (at 
Manchester) out of more than fifty persons, who two 
or three years ago were filled with the love of God, I 
did not find more than a third part, who had not suffer- 
ed loss." Journal, 1766. "I returned to Chester, and 
found many alive to God, but scarce one that had retained 
his pure love." Journal, 1780. In these and in many 
other instances Mr. Wesley taught that the loss of en- 
tire sanctification does not necessarily include the loss of 
justification and all religious life. 



DIVINE MANIFESTATIONS I7 



DIVINE MANIFESTATIONS. 

The word of God teaches with clearness and positive- 
ness that God will manifest Himself to the humble and 
devoted Christian. "He that hath My commandments, 
and keepeth them, he it is that loveth Me: and he that 
loveth Me shall be loved of My Father, and I will love 
him, and will manifest Myself to him/' '*If a man love 
Me, he will keep My words: and My Father will love 
him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode 
with him/' 

Here it is promised that God will manifest Himself 
in some special way to His children, as He does not to 
men in general. This manifestation to the soul refers 
more to illumination and spiritual apprehension than to 
faith. "We will come imto him, and make our abode 
with him," is a promise which has its fulfillment in our 
Saviour's declaration: "Blessed are the pure in heart: 
for they shall see God." They shall have such a clear 
spiritual apprehension of the existence and presence of 
God as serves as a practical vision, and it is as if they 
saw Him with open sight. This is more than mere faith ; 
it is one of the blessed results of faith. It is experience, 
knowledge, and assurance. 

This manifestation is by the Holy Spirit, and implies 
a visit or baptism of the Holy Spirit. Christ said: "If 



l8 SUNSET ECHOES 

I go, I will send the Comforter, and He shall abide In 
you/' The abiding Spirit of God in a fully sanctified 
soul makes the soul as much a knower of salvation as a 
believer in salvation. 

"Faith, Hope, and Love were questioned what they 

thought 
Of future glories, which religion taught; 
Now Faith believed it firmly to he tru^ 
And Hope expected so to find it, too, 
Love answered smiling with a conscious glow, 
Believe! Expect! I know it to be so.** 

This seeing and knowing is not physical, is not of the 
body, but of the mind. It is not by natural vision, not 
by physical senses, but by the internal eye of spiritual per- 
ception. Without running into fanaticism or vagaries, 
it may be said there is an important sense in which wq 
may see God. Christ said: 'The world shall not see 
me, but ye shall see Me." He did not mican that He 
would come again during their lifetime, and they should 
see Him, but that He would so manifest Himself unto 
them that they should know that He was with them, and 
that they had personal interviews and communion with 
Him. Where two or three are gathered in His name. 
His promise is, 'There am I in the midst of them,'' and 
He closed His great commission to His apostles with the 
declaration: 'To, I am with you alway, even unto the 
end of the world/' 

Millions of saints have had a manifestation of Christ 



DIVINE MANIFESTATIONS IQ 

to them, and many can now truthfully declare they have 
communion with Christ and they have seen the Lord. 
There is a moral standpoint of spiritual vision where 
Christ is apprehended as ''the King in His beauty/' as 
*'the Rose of Sharon/' as "the Lily of the valley/' as 
'*the Chief among ten thousand/' as ''the brightness of 
the Father's glory/' and as "Emmanuel, Grod with us/' 
It is not needful to wait until we reach the throne to have 
something of a gaze at the charming glories of the God- 
man. These manifestations of God break the charm of 
the world and lead the soul to exclaim: 

"Far from my heart be joys like these, 
Now I have seen the Lord." 

These baptims of spiritual light and vision are highly 
important to Christian ministers, enabling them to preach 
the Gospel wath faith, love, and power. Men filled with 
the Holy Spirit, with their convictions intensified by the 
power of God, and minds illuminated with the spiritual 
manifestations of the presence and love of Christ, wdll 
declare, like John, "That which w^e have seen and heard 
declare we unto you." No man can preach the Gospel 
wath efficient energy and in the demonstration of the 
Spirit without more or less manifestations of the divine 
presence. O what a joy to preach the blessed truth of 
God under the inspiring impressions made by these man- 
ifestations of the presence of Christ ! It is a great calam- 



20 SUNSET ECHOES 

ity for a minister to lose the presence and power of Christ. 
All that such a man can say about the Gospel of Christ 
is cold and formal. He cannot preach as if he possessed, 
enjoyed, and knew the Lord. The Church needs a fuller 
baptism of experimental light and knowledge to lead a 
lost world to Christ. When God is sought with all the 
heart He will manifest Himself to His people in great 
power and glory. ''Ye shall seek Me and find Me, when 
ye shall search for Me Avith all your heart." 



ON TO HOLINESS OR BACK TO PERDITION 21 



ON TO HOLINESS 0R BACK TO PERDITION. 

All progress toward holiness is on toward heaven, and 
all backsliding from holiness is back toward hell. In re- 
ligious experience not to go forward, is to go backward. 
Strictly speaking there is no standing still in moral con- 
dition. It is either progression, or retrogression. Israel 
could not stand on the borders of Jordan, not to go over 
was to go back. The alternative after regeneration, is 
either entire sanctification or apostacy. 

Thousands of Christian professors advance to certain 
points in Christian life, then pause, and then recede. 
Thougli indisposed to go forward, they fluctuate between 
life and death, and finally either consent to be holy and 
wholly the Lord's or entirely fall away. Whenever a be- 
liever is brought to see his need of perfect holiness, and 
his duty to seek it, and he refuses to yield fully to God 
and do his duty, he will inevitably go back, grieve the 
Holy Spirit, and drift toward perdition. All backsliding 
is in that direction. 

What is the principal cause of so much backsliding 
among Christians? Why is the faith of so many weak- 
ened? their hope dimmed? their love cooled? their zeal 
abated? their meekness gone? their patience exhausted? 
their joy fled? their prospects blurred? their peace dis- 
turbed? arid every other grace diminished? The plain 



22 SUNSET ECHOES 

truth is, they did not follow their convictions, yield fully 
to God and seek to be holy. Inbred sin was allowed to 
remain in their hearts, and as a result their peace, faith 
and love have been antagonized, stabbed, and choked by 
it. The remaining carnal propensities in the believer, 
foster pride, levity, anger, worldliness, self-indulgence 
and every other sin. Indwelling sin harbored will open 
the gates or avenues of the heart, for all kinds of un- 
holiness to enter. The neglect of entire sanctification 
produces backsliding, while seeking, obtaining and re- 
taining it, is an infallible remedy against it. 

Young converts, generally are happy because for a 
time they are faithful to the light and grace they have, 
and they never need be any less happy than in the first 
stages of Christian life, but more, much more so, if they 
live up to their light and duty. Among the first lessons 
of the Bible and the Holy Spirit after conversion is to 
hasten on over into the Canaan of perfect love ; but alas ! 
how many when convicted of their indwelling sin and 
need of purity, refuse to go forward, content themselves 
with what they have experienced, and consequently start 
back and downward toward perdition. Unwilling to go 
forward, they take the back-track, and then come the 
dismal results of a wilderness state — discontent, pertur- 
bation of mind, painful doubts, gloomy fears, fiery trials 
and heavy crosses. The church of God is terribly suflfer- 
ing everywhere, with multitudes of backslidden profes- 



ON TO HOLINESS OR BACK TO PERDITION 27, 

sors, in just this unhappy, melancholy condition. Is it 
strange that the world thinks that reUgion must be a 
gloomy thing? 

What is true of the members of the church, in this 
respect, is equally true of ministers who fail to press on 
after entire sanctification. If a minister neglects his 
duty, and fails to be a holy man, the work of grace in 
his heart will decline, his power and usefulness diminish, 
and he will become more and more a failure. He may 
study hard, and try to make up in earnestness, literary 
attainments, and hard work, but with a declining re- 
ligious life and decreasing devotion to God, his ministry 
will be less and less satisfactory and useful. 

When personal holiness is not sought, the natural re- 
sults are more selfishness, more covetousness and self- 
indulgence, and less ardent, persistent successful work 
for God and sotils. 

When any Christian refuses to seek holiness he turns 
liis back upon Christ, whose blood ''cleanseth from all 
sin,'' and draws his heart away from fellowship with God. 
The result is barrenness of soul, fiery chastisements, 
and a scourge of many troubles. Those, who were 
once happy in God and happy in their work, now become 
subjects of distressing temptations, violent suggestions 
from Satan, and doubt that they were ever converted. 
God seems to sufifer the devil to harass and distress them 
to drive them back to Christ. O, how many wdio w^ere 



24 SUNSET ECHOES 

once full of peace, liglit, and usefulness have gone back, 
and have closed up their lives in doubt, shadows, and dis- 
appointments ! 

Backsliders, and apostates from Christianity are not 
only the most guilty, but die most unhappy of mortals. 
By refusing to go forward and seek holiness, they sin 
against greatest light, and become more miserable than 
ordinary sinners. The love of God withers and fades 
out of their hearts, and they become soured, jealous, dis- 
satisfied, and seek relief in earthly pleasures, and be- 
come "worldly, sensual and devilish.'' "The latter end 
of them is worse than the beginning." They do not go 
on to holiness, but back to perdition. Reader, which 
way are you going? Are you headed, and making prog- 
ress heavenward, or are you on the down grade ? Which 
— on to holiness, or back to perdition? 



BLOW THE TRUMPET LONG AND LOUD 



BLOW THE TRUMPET LONG AND LOUD. 

There are breakers ahead ! The church of God is in 
the midst of increasing dangers ! These are perilous 
times ! InfideUty, the rum curse, and the devil and secret- 
ism more than ever are bold, active and rampant, while 
multitudes in the churches are either blind, asleep or 
dead. 

There is a rising tide of unbelief, carelessness, reck- 
lessness, licentiousness, fraud, worldliness and ungodli- 
ness setting in around the church on all sides. How pow- 
erless many professing Christians, to resist these evil in- 
fluences and exert good ones ! 

The way many churches are treating the duty and 
privilege of personal sanctification is manifestly displeas- 
ing God, and grieving his Holy Spirit. 

The obligation to be pure in heart and entirely devoted 
to God, who can deny? Mark how God enjoins holiness, 
and how he enforces it, and how his appeals are re- 
jected, and his provision for it neglected. He reveals 
his own unsullied holiness, and then commands his peo- 
ple to be holy as he is holy. He gives his own Son as 
an atoning sacrifice, whose precious blood cleanseth from 
all sin. He gives the church ''exceeding great and pre- 
cious promises,'' that she may be filled with the ''divine 
nature.'' He furnishes us the Holy Spirit and commands 



26 SUNSET ECHOES 

US to ''be filled with it/' as a living, divine energy. He 
tells his church plainly that ''Without holiness no man 
shall see the Lord/' 

How are these important and blessed truths treated by 
the mass of the church? Great multitudes doubt and 
deny the practicability of becoming holy as God requires, 
until death. The future life alone they set apart for en- 
tire sanctification ; the present they regard as destined 
to mixed holiness and sin. That man can and ought to 
be saved from all sin in this life is regarded as rank 
heresy. Many of our fashionable chhrches will not en- 
dure the plain, faithful preaching of entire sanctification. 

Unbelief is the great sin of these times, both within 
and without the church, and it is fruitful of the most 
alarming results. Nothing can be so fatal to the soul as 
unbelief. It always has been so. It is now so, and it 
always will be so, and I may add, it ought to be so. When 
the church harbors unbelief she forfeits her hold upon 
th;e promised strength of God, and like Samson, is shorn 
of her locks. Unbelief would paralyze the energies of 
an angel. 

Oh ! how much tolerating, countenancing and defend- 
ing sin there is among church members. It gives place 
to the devil, displeases God and works ruin. This is 
that which we fear is gradually killing thousands of 
American churches which are cold and seemingly power- 
less to evangelize this world and bring lost men to God. 



BLOW THE TRUMPET LONG AND LOUD 27 

There never was a time, perhaps, when Hght and truth 
were poured in upon the church more than now, 
and the duty and privilege of being saved from sin and 
made pure in heart; and yet there probably was never 
half as much effort, learning, talent and philosophy ex- 
pended to defend sin and hold on to it as now. 

Christ came to put away sin ; his blood cleanseth from 
all sin. He cannot and will not sanction any sin. When 
those who profess to be his people stand back from duty, 
and excuse, defend and hold on to sin, he will forsake 
them. This is the reason why the heavens over many of 
the churches are brass; they are pining and dying out, 
while infidelity, licentiousness. Sabbath desecration, 
drunkenness, rowdyism and the like are on the increase 
almost everywhere. 

God has a controversy to-day with the Christian 
church for her unbelief, remissness, failure to put on her 
strength and come up to his help against the mighty. 
Millions are marching hellward, while the great body of 
the visible church are doubting, hesitating, or caviling 
over the duty and privilege of Christian sanctification. 

It is as clear as the sun in mid-heavens that the press- 
ing need of the church is holiness and power, evangelical, 
aggressive power. This is needed a thousand times more 
than anything else to save the church from her miserable 
wranglings, her cursing church trials, her paralyzing 



28 SUNSET ECHOES 

unbelief, her fairs, her festivals and church frolics, and 
from all torpidity, worldliness and spiritual death. 

Satan is prowling around our churches, and back- 
sliders are dropping out on every side, and this is no 
time for the ministers of God to sleep at their posts. 
The lines need to be more sharply drawn and the watch- 
men more bold, independent, and outspoken. Let Zion's 
watchman *'cry aloud, spare not, lift up their voice like 
a trumpet and show God's people their transgression and 
the house of Jacob their sins." 

"Let Zion's watchmen all arise. 
And take the alarm they give," 

and let the trumpet be blown long and loud until mil- 
lions come who are ready to perish. 



WHY DO SO MANY LOSE PERFECT FAITH ? 2g 



WHY DO SO MANY LOSE PERFECT LOVE? 

It is a sad fact that some, and perhaps many, lose 
the grace of perfect love, and some several times before 
they become established therein. The same fact is true, 
and much more frequent, in the loss of justification. It 
is a common thing for converts to lose the light and wit- 
ness of justification many times before they become fully 
established therein. There is no necessity of this loss in 
either case, and we think there is much less danger of 
losing perfect love (other circumstances being equal) 
than justification. 

The causes are very similar, and largely the same as 
those that cause the loss of justification. If the light of 
justification were more clear and general in the church, 
less converts would lose justification during their early 
experience; and, if the blessing of perfect love were 
more generally sought and possessed by the ministry 
and membership, and more clearly and faithfully preach- 
ed and exemplified in the pulpit, but few who obtain it 
would lose it. 

It is to be feared that many lose the clear light and 
experience of purity for the want of practical sympathy 
and wholesome instruction from the pulpit. People who 
possess full salvation, and are striving to love God with 
all their hearts, have a right to expect encouragement and 



30 SUNSET ECHOES 

help from the pulpit ; but in many instances how little 
help they get from the defective and contradictory teach- 
ing given though there be no decided opposition to the 
subject. 

Is it a marvel that some lose the witness and bless- 
ing of perfect love, if they be located where they find 
little or no sympathy for it, and where they do not hear 
more than a sermon or two a year on the subject, and 
those made up of indefinite generalities and cautions 
against high professions, such sermons as are frequently 
preached by those who do not possess the experience or 
are not earnestly seeking it? 

Those possessing perfect love need help and encour- 
agement from the pulpit, as well as those who do not 
possess it. The pulpit is the main place to present gos- 
pel truth, and feed all classes of Christian believers with 
the ''bread of life." The plain fact is, the diluted, con- 
fused, crude and anti-evangelical notions, which many of 
our churches sit under, is anything but gospel preach- 
ing. It is a burning shame that many of our churches 
are pining and withering under pulpit administrations 
composed largely of short intellectual essays, scientific, 
metaphysical, geological, astronomical and speculative, 
full of almost everything except plain gospel truth. It 
is a serious question how long the Church of God can 
live on such pulpit matter. It is anything but the ''bread 
of life,'- such as the Bible furnishes to feed, strengthen 



WHY EO SO MANY LOSE PERFECT FAITH? 3I 

and establish the sons and daughters of the Lord Al- 
mighty. 

Let sympathy in the Church become as general in 
favor of entire sanctification as it is for justification, and 
let it be preached with the clearness and frequency its 
importance demands, and let its possessors and wit- 
nesses in both the ministry and laity be treated as others 
are, and we shall hear of but few losing the grace. The 
condition of things in many of our churches is present- 
ed by Dr. Adam Clarke: ''Most who call themselves 
Christians hate the doctrine of holiness ; never hear it 
inculcated without pain; the principal part of their 
studies, and those of their pastors, is to find out with 
how little holiness they can rationally expect to enter 
into the kingdom of heaven.*' "Theology,'' p. 203. 

Mr. Wesley rebuked some in his day the same way 
that some need in our day : "Those who love God with 
all their heart must expect much opposition from profes- 
sors who have gone on for twenty years in an old beaten 
track and fancy they are wiser than all the world. These 
always oppose the work of sanctification most." He 

wrote to one of his ministers : "I hope Bro. C is 

not ashamed to preach full salvation receivable now by 
faith. This is the word which God will always bless and 
which the devil peculiarly hates ; therefore, he is con- 
stantly stirring up both his own children and the weak 
children of God against it." 



SUNSET ECHOES 



FROM GLORY TO GLORY. 

The breezes of Paradise, sacred and divine, float 
about the word "glory ;'' it is inspired and identified with 
our interest and future blessedness. **But we all, with 
open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, 
are changed into the same image, from glory to glory, 
even as by the spirit of the Lord'' (II G>r, iii :i8). There 
are phases of religious truth, experience and divine mani- 
festations to which this word "glory'' refers. 

It sometimes refers to the infinite perfections, grace 
and blessedness of God, at other times to the fullness, 
power and efficiency of the gospel ; and not unf requently 
refers to the experience, moral condition and blessedness 
of the Christian believer; on this last aspect I desire to 
write a few items. 

The gifts of God in personal salvation are said to 
be "according to the riches of his glory." Our Savior 
said, "And the glory which thou gavest me, I have 
given them." Christians are exhorted to "walk worthy 
of God, who has called them unto his kingdom and 
glory." St. Paul says the Ephesian Christians were 
called by the gospel to the "obtaining of the glory of 
our Lord Jesus Christ." The Christians at Colosse were 
to be "strengthened with all power, according to the 
might of God's glory," and "possess the knowledge of 



FROM GLORY TO GLORY 33 

the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ/' Paul 
says to Timothy : 'The gospel of the glory of the blessed 
God was committed to his trust/' The manifestation of 
God to his saints is ''Christ in you the hope of glory/' 

This word in regard to the saints of God expresses 
a divine manifestation of extreme blessedness. God is 
pleased to permit the Christian to press into his manifest 
glory, and this glory of God is a personal experience in 
this world, and is preparatory to an "eternal weight" of 
divine glory in the heavenly world. This glory is to be 
actualized by the Christian, and begins and advances 
from stage to stage in this life, as is taught in II Cor. 
ii:i8. "But we all, with open face beholding as in a 
glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same 
image from glory to glory, even as by the spirit of the 
Lord/' 

God has promised to be the glory in the midst of his 
people. Moses saw the glory and was so transformed 
by it that he covered his face with a veil, as the people 
could not bear the reflected light and glory. "For our 
light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for 
us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory/' 
Dr. Adam Clark says, "This glory is a divine radiance so 
intense as to have weight — 'weight which is exceeding, 
and far more than exceeding — eternal." 

This divine glory is susceptible of experimental 
demonstration in Christian experience. I will give a few 



34 SUNSET ECHOES 

witnesses. Many might be given. Rev. John Fletcher 
testifies to this experience. He says: ''I was favored 
Hke Moses, with a supernatural discovery of the glory 
of God, in an ineffable converse with him, face to face : 
so that whether I was then in the body or out of the 
body, I cannot tell.'' Rev. William Bramv^ell says : 'The 
glory I then experienced was beyond all I can now re- 
late. I was filled with mercy and I could have shouted 
mercy continually.'' 

William Carvosso, a prominent member of the Wes- 
leyan connection in the days of Wesley, says: '*I was 
one night in bed, so filled, so overpowered with the 
glory of God." * * * "Beholding as in a glass the 
glory of the Lord, I was changed into the same image 
from glory to glory by the spirit of the Lord." At an- 
other time he says : ''Had he not veiled his glory in a 
moment, I could not have lived under it." President 
Charles G. Finney, for many years president of Oberlin 
College, and one of the most prominent evangelists of 
modern times, says : "As I came up to the door of the 
church, all at once the glory of the Lord shone upon 
and around about me, in a manner most marvelous. * 
* * This light seemed to be like the brightness of 
the sun in every direction. It was too intense for the 
eyes. * * * it was such a light as I could not have 
endured long." 

Rev. Asa Mahan, D. D., LL. D., gives his experience 



FROM GLORY TO GLORY 35 

as follows : ''I now come to speak of a source of bless- 
edness, to the description of which, I fear, I shall be 
able to make but a feeble approach. It is what, for want 
of better language to express, I would call those open, 
direct and inconceivably sweet visions which, a great 
portion of the time, I have of the infinite beauty, loveli- 
ness and ineffable glory of Jesus Christ and of the God- 
head as manifest in him. * * * j^ ^^g ^ baptism in 
which the Son of Righteousness shone out in cloudless 
light, beauty, sweetness and glory, upon my soul." 

Bishop L. L. Hamline wrote to his wife from the 
General Conference in 1844: ''I often feel like a burn- 
ing bush as I sit in the conference room. It is some- 
times difficult for me to remain in my seat.'* At an- 
other time he writes : *'Such blessings are poured upon 
me when I kneel in prayer, that it seems as though I can- 
not live." 

God has promised to manifest himself to his people 
as he does not unto the world, and he has done it in all 
ages, and is doing it now to millions in the universal 
church. The repeated perusal of ''The Real Christian,'' 
by Rev. S. P. Jacobs, a book of rare spiritual insight, 
has inspired this paper, and from that valuable book I 
have gathered and quoted some items in this article. 



36 SUNSET ECHOES 



TMB PERSONALITY AND DIVINITY OF THE 
HOLY SPIRIT. 

"But the Comforter, even the Holy Spirit, whom the 
Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all 
things,'' (John xiv:26). The proper personality of the 
Holy Spirit, as well as his divinity, is greatly ignored. 
The personal pronoun ''it,'' shows the extent to which 
his proper personality is ignored. 

Our dispensation — the Christian dispensation — is the 
dispensation of the Holy Spirit, and to ignore the per- 
sonality of the Holy Spirit is a gross impropriety, wheth- 
er done unwittingly or intentionally. ''Where is your 
son John? It left home this morning, and it said it 
would be gone a month, and we miss it." If such usage 
would be derogatory to a man, how much more to the 
Holy Spirit? I am glad that the pronominal distinction 
of the Holy Spirit is always expressed in the Revised 
Version. 

The personality of the Holy Spirit is the same as that 
of the Father and the Son, as seen in hundreds of pas- 
sages and in all parts of the Bible. I give a few samples 
in which personality is seen. "The Holy Ghost said, 
Separate me, Barnabas and Saul for the work," (Acts 
xxiii:2). "And while Peter thought on the vision, the 
Spirit said unto him, behold three men seek thee," (Acts 



PERSONALITY AND DIVINITY OF THE HOLY SPIRIT 37 

x:i9). ''But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, 
whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach 
you all things,'' (John xiv:26). ''He shall guide you 
into all truth. For he shall not speak of himself; but 
whatsoever he shall hear that shall he speak,'' (John xiv: 

13). 

The personality of the Spirit is taught in those texts 
ascribing to him volitions and affections; as "abide," 
"dwelleth," "teach," "testify," "searcheth," "grieved/^ 
"The Spirit also hdpeth our infirmities * * * the 
Spirit himself maketh intercession for us." Manifesta- 
tions of will, affections and works on the part of Christ 
taught his distinct personality, and they equally do the 
same regarding the personality of the Holy Spirit. 

Personality manifests itself in thought, feeling and 
volition, and the Holy Spirit thinks, feels, wills and 
acts, and is therefore a Person. In our Articles of Re- 
ligion it is clearly stated : "The Holy Ghost proceedeth 
from the Father and the Son, is one substance, majesty, 
and glory with the Father and Son, very and eternal 
God." The Holy Spirit is the object of trust, obedience 
and worship, equally with the Father and the Son. Bap- 
tism is in the name of the Father and of the Son, and 
of the Holy Ghost. All divine titles and attributes are 
ascribed equally to the three persons in the Godhead, 
and one is as much the object of adoration, love and 
devotion as the other. 



38 SUNSET ECHOES 

The Father, Son and Holy Spirit, the Trinity in the 
divine essence, is such that the three Persons are ex- 
ternally equal in all essential being. In the plan of sal- 
vation the Father is supreme over the Son and Holy 
Spirit. This is only in official action, as has been well 
said, ''All grace originates in the Father, is mediated 
through the Son and applied by the Holy Spirit.'' "For 
God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten 
Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, 
but have everlasting life,'' (John iii:i6). ''He (the Holy 
Spirit) shall glorify me; for he shall take of mine and 
shall declare it unto you," (John xvi:i4). See also 
John xiv:26. 

Although the Holy Spirit is a Divine Person in the 
Trinity, according to the Scriptures and common usage, 
in describing things as they appear to us, it is appropriate 
to pray for the Holy Spirit to be poured upon us, as in 
our church ritual : "The Lord pour upon thee the Holy 
Ghost for the office and work of an elder in the church 
of God." 

The Holy Spirit is the Executive of the Godhead, 
and is the divine agent, in conviction, regeneration and 
entire sanctification, and all the further work of illumina- 
tion, intensification and growth in love, knowledge and 
holiness. The Holy Spirit reveals the Father and the 
Son to the soul of the believer: "No man can say 



PERSONALITY AND DIVINITY OF THE HOLY SPIRIT 39 

(know) Jesus is Lord, but by the Holy Spirit/' (I Cor. 
xii:3). 

It is time that all Christians bear in mind in a prac- 
tical way, and by an active faith in the divine person- 
ality of the Holy Spirit and not ignore him by calling 
him it, or a divine influence, or some other impersonal 
name. We may know the Holy Ghost ; may be conscious 
of his sacred presence and enjoy blessed communion with 
him as the Third Person in the Holy Trinity. This is 
no fanaticism, but conscious religious experience, and in 
accord with Scripture truth. The Christian's heart is a 
temple of the Holy Ghost. 



40 SUNSET ECHOES 



DO ALL TO THE GLORY OF GOD. 

The inspired direction is very plain — ''Whether there- 
fore ye eat or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the 
glory of God/' The glory of God is his praise and 
honor, and this is to be the great object of our pursuit. 
The term ''whatsoever,'' in this passage, includes all our 
doings. All our acts, great and small, must have God's 
glory in view, for their end. His command takes in 
what are commonly considered small thingsi — "Wheth- 
er, therefore, ye eat or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do 
all to the glory of God." 

This Scripture, like hundreds of others, covers the 
card-playing, theater-going and dancing question prom- 
inent at this time. If God is to be obeyed, our amuse- 
ments and recreations should be regulated by this com- 
mand. It is not advice; it is a divine command, plain 
and positive. If it is observed, the ultimate object in 
all our recreations must be "the glory of God." 

There are times when relaxation is as much a duty 
as work, and a change in the trend of thought and pur- 
suit is necessary to our health and usefulness. Not all 
pleasantry and merriment is wrong or injurious. Solo- 
mon says, "A merry heart doeth good like a medicine." 
But nothing should be indulged or done that either antag- 
onizes Christ, or dissipates religious feelings. We 



DO ALL TO THE GLORY OF GOD 4I 

should neither go anywhere, nor do anything upon which 
we cannot ask the blessing of God. Nothing should be 
approved, or indulged in inconsistent with the sacred, 
Christian profession. 

The card table, the circus, the races, the dance hall 
and the theater are no places for Christian people. All 
of these are generally regarded by the Christian Church 
as injurious in dissipation and destructive of Christian 
character. They are more or less, sensuous, debasing and 
demoralizing, and are not in the "narrow way that lead- 
eth unto life. 

If rest, change and recreation be needed, there are 
plenty of ways which are consistent with righteousness 
and which do not compromise Christian character. Rest 
and change may be sought as wisely and piously as sleep. 
As to recreation, there are many innocent ways in which 
our languid spirits and exhausted strength may be re- 
animated and refreshed. The term recreation with many 
is about synonymous with dissipation, but its real mean- 
ing is to refresh, revive and reanimate. It is in this 
sense that the Christian can take lawful and needed recre- 
ation. 

The foregoing Scripture furnishes us a rule for guid- 
ance in respect to all the customs and maxims of so- 
ciety. In so far as they can be followed to the glory of 
God, well ; and when not, we should discard them, come 



42 SUNSET ECHOES 

out from them, be separate. Christians are to reform the 
world, and not be deformed by it. 

Some people think those items are small things and 
of no special importance or consequence. This is a se- 
rious mistake. The sum of life is made up of little items, 
and the little items have more to do in the formation of 
our character and deciding our destiny, than the few 
great items, so-called. 

An approving Christian conscience is impossible with- 
out observing the minutia of duty. There are, strictly 
speaking, no such things as small sins. They may ap- 
pear so to dark and corrupt minds, but they are not so 
in the eye of God, nor in fact. All sin is a violation of 
God's law, and his law is one. The same authority en- 
joins every precept, and each sin involves a rejection of 
that authority. Every sin is rebellion against God, and 
that rebellion may be just as obstinate and offensive to 
God in small things (so-called) as in great things. It 
is never a small matter to disobey God. He or she, who 
frequents the theater, the dance hall, the races and the 
card table, does not live to the glory of God and should 
not be tolerated in the church of God. 



CHRISTIAN ASSURANCE 43 



CHI^ISTIAN ASSURANCE. 

Personal Christian testimony is an important part 
of all gospel preaching. St. Paul's commission reads as 
follows : ''I have appeared unto thee for this purpose, to 
make thee a minister and a witness/' Acts 26:16. The 
church has always conquered, as she has been a witness- 
ing church to the ''blood of the lamb" and by ''the word 
of their testimony." 

A witness is to testify to what he knows. Definite 
knowledge is the base of definite testimony. Personal 
testimony by the Christian is based upon the work and 
direct witness of the Holy Spirit. Only as one knows 
Christ and gospel truth by inward experience can he be 
an actual witness for Christ. "No man can say that 
Jesus is the Lord but by the Holy Ghost," I Cor. 12:3. 
The appointment of the Pentecost was to qualify the 
apostles by personal experience to be witnesses for 
Christ. "Ye shall receive power, after that the Holy 
Ghost is come upon you and ye shall be witnesses unto 
me both in Jerusalem and in all Judea," etc., Acts i :8. 

The direct testimony of the Holy Spirit is the safe- 
guard of Christianity. "The Spirit himself beareth wit- 
ness with our spirit that we are the children of God," 
Rom. 8: 16. "God who knoweth the hearts bare them wit- 
ness, giving them the Holy Ghost," Acts 15: 9. "Now 



44 SUNSET ECHOES 

if any man have not the spirit of Christ he is none of 
his/' Rom. 8:9. '''Now we have received, not the spirit 
of the world, but the spirit which is of God, that we may 
know the things that are freely given to us of God. 

This direct and immediate witness or assurance given 
by the Holy Spirit, excludes doubt or uncertainty as to 
our pardon and acceptance from God. It unites together 
the divine and the human consciousness by faith in Christ. 
This assurance is the strongest possible that can be 
given of any fact in religion, science or nature. It is 
intuitive, and if anything is infallible, it is. It is not an 
inference, it is immediate self-consciousness, and the 
evidence of self-consciousness is infallible. John Stuart 
Mill says : "Whatever is known to us by consciousness 
is known beyond the possibility of doubt.'' John Wes- 
ley declares, "I judge it is impossible that this man (who 
has the witness of the Spirit) should be deceived therein, 
as that God should lie." 

Luther, Melancthon and many of the refoi^mers, fre- 
quently and strongly asserted that every believer is con- 
scious of his own acceptance with God and that by a 
supernatural evidence. Sir William Hamilton, a Pres- 
byterian, declares : "Assurance, personal assurance, was 
long and universally held in the Protestant communities 
to be the criterion and condition of true, saving faith." 

Religious experience is experimental and positive. 
"The kingdom of God is within you," Luke 17 :2i ; "The 



CHRISTIAN ASSURANCE 45 

kingdom of God is righteousness, peace and joy in the 
Holy Ghost/' Rom. 14:17. A knowledge of God and 
"the kingdom of God'' is reported to our consciousness 
within the soul by the Holy Spirit. God is within the 
Christian and is as near him as he is to himself. Com- 
munion and fellowship with God implies this : *Tor ye 
are the temple of the living God, as God hath said, I will 
dwell in them and walk in them," H Cor. 6:16. The 
Father, Son and Spirit comes into fellowship and union 
with the Christian's spirit. This is not only a truth 
of revelation, but of consciousness and positive experi- 
ence. 

This blessed assurance is being largely neglected, 
ignored or rejected in the churches and multitudes of 
professed believers are living without the experience. 
Let it become general as it ought to be and it would 
resurrect our class-meetings and love feasts and give 
the church victorious power to bring lost men to Christ. 
Let the ministry of the church stand out clear in this 
experience and their notions of evolution and higher 
criticism will fade away like the mist of the morning. 
It will exclude all doubt as to the personality of God, 
or the divinity of Christ, or a supernatural religious ex- 
perience by the Holy Spirit and the inspired word. 



46 SUNSET ECHOES 



SCRIPTURAL ASKING. 

*'What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, be- 
lieve that ye receive them, and ye shall have them/' — 
Mark 1 1 124. 

There has been some difference of opinion in regard 
to the meaning of this passage. 

This passage does not teach that any blessing can 
be received independently of the established conditions 
of its besto'wment. 

It does not teach that faith in the fact of receiving a 
blessing is the condition of receiving it. Such faith 
would involve the absurdity of believing it is done, and it 
will be done. The effort of faith is not to embrace the 
fact of receiving a blessing, so as to make the belief that 
we receive the condition on which we receive. 

This passage does not teach that any are to believe 
they receive without a present, simple, appropriating 
faith in the merits of Christ. 

It does not teach that any are to believe they receive 
without reasonable and proper cause for so doing. When 
a soul is clearly conscious of having complied with the 
terms of salvation, God's promise and warrant render 
safe and proper the belief that He now accepts and saves. 

''Believe that ye receive them'' — When? Just when 
you comply with the conditions; not before you comply 



SCRIPTURAL ASKING 47 

with them, and not after yon have complied with them. 
You are not to believe that you receive them after you 
have got them, on the one hand, or before you obtain them, 
on the other. 

''And ye shall receive them.'* When? Not before 
you believe, but just when you believe, not have 
received, but that ye receive just now while you are be- 
lieving, ''According to your faith be it unto you,'' is 
the established order of God; and evangelical believ- 
ing and receiving are inseparably joined together, and 
cannot be put asunder. 

*'Must I believe I receive the blessing just now, vnth- 
out evidence that I do receive it ?" You are by no n.eans 
to believe without evidence; but the evidences upon 
which your faith is to rest for the blessing now, are the 
promise, faithfulness, and certainty of God's word, and 
not your feelings or imaginations, which may deceive 
you. You are to believe that you receive on the author- 
ity of Jesus Christ, you, on your part, having complied 
with the divinely appointed conditions. 

The faith that saves, that claims the promise, that re- 
lies and walks out on God's word, must precede the con- 
sciousness or interior witness of possession. There can 
be no room for saving faith after visible or tangible mani- 
festations, or after the blessing is received. It is a mat- 
ter of knowledge then. 

Mr. Fletcher says : ''Beware of looking for any peace 



48 SUNSET ECHOES 

or joy previous to your believing, and let this be upper- 
most in your mind/' 

You say: "I do not see and I do not feel any evi- 
dence that I receive the blessing/' If you have com- 
pletely submitted to God, you are to believe, and have 
no right to doubt God's word because of any absence of 
feeling. Your faith for salvation is not to rest upon 
sight or feeling. The Bible says faith is evidence of 
things not seen. Faith in feeling, or in seeing, or in the 
v^ritness of the Spirit, does not save; but faith, simple, 
naked faith in the v^ord of God, does. 

Seeing, feeling, and possessing the evidences of sal- 
vation must be subsequent to its reception. The bless- 
ing is conditioned on faith, and this faith must rest on 
the truth of God, as the evidences of possessing the bless- 
ing cannot exist before the blessing is received. Dr. True 
says: *T know of no way to obtain this salvation, but 
to follow the exact directions given: 'Believe that ye 
receive, and you shall have.' " Again he says : ''You 
need not be afraid to believe that you receive while you 
pray; for, according to the testimony of thousands, you 
will thereupon receive the direct witness of the Spirit, 
This is what you have hoped to receive first, in order to 
believe; but it comes, if it comes at all, as the confirma- 
tion of your faith." 

We can obtain salvation only by believing and trust- 
ing God. And an evangelical belief and trust in God 



SCRIPTURAL ASKING 49 

can be exercised only in connection with complete sub- 
mission to him. 

Men are prone to live by sense rather than by faith, 
and are inclined to trust every thing and every body, but 
God. This passage teaches the great and important 
duty of purely trusting and believing God. 



50 SUNSET ECHOES 



HOLINESS IN THE LIFE. 

A holy life can emanate only from a holy heart, and a 
holy heart renders a holy life natural, easy and prac- 
ticable. Purity of heart can be secured only by the cleans- 
ing blood and power of Christ; and it can be retained 
only by the pervading and keeping power of the Holy 
Spirit. The heart was made to flow through and pervade 
all our activities, and hence a holy life is the legitimate 
fruit or outcome of purity of heart. 

A holy life includes abstinence from all wrong doing, 
and the doing all things pleasing to God. Its root prin- 
ciple is the spirit of obedience in entire consecration to 
God. A holy life involves several essential items: 

I. It implies the seeking to know, as far as possible, 
the will of God ; to study the Bible to learn His will, and 
to spend all necessary time in prayer for wisdom, and 
guidance. 

2. It implies that as far as possible, according to our 
best knowledge, we devote every power and faculty to 
the accomplishment of those objects which we believe 
God requires us to promote. Holy living requires a su- 
preme regard to the will of God in all things. 

3. It carries with it, as far as possible, a right es- 
timate of the relative importance of things — spiritual and 
physical, temporal and eternal ; our own interests and 



HOLINESS IN THE LIFE 51 

other's interests; and that we give attention to things 
according to their perceived value. HoHness is harmony 
with truth and wisdom, and a Hfe of hoHness expands our 
powers, helps our infirmities, regulates our passions 
propensities and habits, and conforms in all things to 
the perceived will of God. 

4. Living holiness includes not only supreme love 
to God, but equal and impartial love to our fellowmen. 
Our neighbor's interests must be regarded as of equal 
value with our own, so that we respect their rights as 
we do our own; their rights of property, their comfort, 
convenience, reputation and happiness, their improvement 
and salvation. With a holy man, if there be a failure 
in these respects, it is through mistake and not of de- 
sign, and is only occasional and not habitual. 

5. Holy living implies not only right activities, but 
right feelings toward God and man. A pure heart ex- 
cludes all wrong feelings, and though our sensibility is 
not voluntary, yet when under the gracious power of the 
Holy Spirit we will possess such emotions of the sen- 
sibility as are proper in our relations to God and our fel- 
lows. There will be feelings of gratitude, love and com- 
placency toward God, and feelings of sympathy, compas- 
sion, forbearance and brotherly love toward men. 

All the emotions and feelings of a holy life are such 
as naturally exist in connection with the entire consecra- 
tion of every faculty and energy to God. The pure heart 



52 SUNSET ECHOES 

carries the whole train of its affectional nature to God 
and humanity. One of the special works of the Holy 
Spirit is to bless, refresh and regulate the human sensi- 
bility. A holy man will not only act right but will feel 
right. Human feelings partake of moral quality, and as 
such are instruments of righteousness or of unrighteous- 
ness. 

6. Holy living includes a conscience void of offence 
toward God and toward man. A constant aim to please 
God, with the best possible effort to do it, is all that God 
requires. The man who does all he can to please God, 
by the grace of God, is a holy man. We are obliged to 
do only what we can do, by the help of the Holy Spirit, 
and are not under obligation to do what we have no 
power to do. It is a self-evident truth that obligation 
can extend no further than ability. He who does all he 
has ability (both natural and gracious) to do, does all 
that God requires. It should not be forgotten that God 
will supplement human weakness by His most gracious 
ability, thus enabling all who seek His aid to do all His 
good pleasure. St. Paul says: "I can do all things 
through Christ which strengtheneth me." 



PERFECTION 53 



PERFECTION. 

Sanctification, holiness and perfection are to some ex- 
tent synonyms. They have shades of difference, but they 
are so sHght as not to exclude their use as alternates to 
avoid tautology. Unsanctified humanity very generally 
possess a deep-seated prejudice against the term *'perfec- 
tion/' when asserted of Christian character. When this 
term is used respecting anything but fully sanctified hu- 
manity, it is understood and generally approved. The 
inspired Word of God, which deals with things as they 
are and calls them by right names, uses perfection and 
its equivalents more frequently than any other term re- 
specting Christian character and experience. The word 
perfection and its relatives occur one hundred and one 
t;imes in the Scriptures. In over fifty of these instances 
it is asserted of human character under the operations of 
grace. 

Perfection is simply completeness. It may be regard- 
ing things physical, intellectual, or moral. In the sense 
of completeness it is used almost universally, and no one 
objects to it. No one thinks of attaching absoluteness to 
it, nor do people find any difficulty in understanding it. 
Who ever heard it objected to, except in regard to God's 
saints ? 

Every created thing has its normal or necessary lim- 



54 SUNSET ECHOES 

its, while the uncreated God alone ha3 absolute or unlim- 
ited perfection. There is a gradation which belongs to all 
the works of God, and there must be various sorts and 
degrees of perfection appropriate to each realm of be- 
ing. Every creature of God may be perfect after its kind, 
and according to its nature and degree, and this term is 
just as legitimate respecting the lower grades as the 
higher. 

We say a plant or tree is perfect when it has neither 
deficiency nor redundancy ; having no defect in root, stem, 
leaf or flower. It possesses all that belong? to its sphere 
as a tree or plant. It may be smaller or larger, younger 
or older than some other tree or plant. It is complete in 
the sense of possessing all that is essential to it, or that 
belongs to it. 

Angels are perfect according to their nature and ca- 
pacity. They are perfect as angels, but are imperfect as 
compared with the absolute perfection of God. Chris- 
tian perfection is graded according to the sphere and ca- 
pacity of a man. When a Christian is complete accord- 
ing to his sphere of being and the dispensation in which 
he lives, he is a perfect Christian. 

Let it be remembered God measures responsibility ac- 
cording to what a man hath, and not according to what 
he hath not. When this term is applied to Christians, 
as in all other cases, it is to be understood to mean a rela- 
tive and modified perfection, according to the capacity, 



PERFECTION 55 

possibilities and facts of each individual case. Where 
much is given much is required. There is perfection in 
things small as well as in things great. 

Fallen man, regenerated and fully sanctified, has his 
sphere in the mediatorial economy; and whatever that 
is is his perfection, and is Christian perfection. This in 
every case is a fullness of love, pure love in a purified 
soul. It is easy to see that this much abused 
term, when used respecting sanctified believers, is to be 
viewed in a restricted sense, and modified by the object 
to which it refers, the same as in other cases. In the na- 
ture of things the term implies limitations, except when 
applied to the unlimited God. 

We notice that those who reject the use of this term, 
in respect to Christian character, affix to the word but one 
single idea, and that of absoluteness, implying absolute 
perfection. The error of applying absolute perfection to 
this Bible word, is very common with the opponents of 
Christian perfection. 

The Holy Ghost has employed this word, and it does 
not indicate humility to question the wisdom of its use. 
It is pushed into the foreground in Bible terminology, and 
it is folly to either reject the term or the blessed expe- 
rience and life it expresses. Our Lord Jesus is a per- 
fect and almighty Savior, and he can make his children 
perfect Christians. He can ''save to the uttermost," and 
it is our duty and privilege to be saved from all sin and 



56 SUNSET ECHOES 

all sinfulness ; from all guilt by a full pardon ; from the 
dominion of sin by the power of the Holy Ghost; from 
all the pollution and the disposition to sin by the cleans- 
ing blood of ChriwSt. It is herein that our love is made 
perfect, and we are enabled to love God with all our 
hearts and our neighbors as ourselves. Let as many as 
are perfect be thus minded. 



THE TURPITUDE OF SIN 57 



THE TURPITUDE OF SIN. 

Much of modern preaching is remiss in not present- 
ing more of the nature, the turpitude and results of sin, 
and the necessity of salvation from it. Salvation is free- 
dom from sin and its consequences. Jesus Christ came 
into the world to save sinners, and sinners are saved, only 
as they are saved from sin. 

I have not written in respect to original sin ; the cor- 
ruption or infection of human nature — the result of actual 
sin, but of sin as acts of disobedience. 

Nearly all systems of unbelief minify sin, and regard 
it as a trivial matter and treat it accordingly. Men are 
usually governed by their views of things, and act in har- 
mony with their opinion. ''As a man thinketh so is he." 

Sin, every sin, properly speaking is a violation or 
transgression of the law of God, by either commission or 
omission. This law is His written or unwritten will, a 
transcript of His mind, and the standard of moral recti- 
tude in the universe. As such, it is perfect, impartial, 
just, necessary and divine. The law is holy and the com- 
miandment holy, just and good, and was ordained unto 
life. This law is the determination of all the moral at- 
tributes of God's nature, it emanates from the fountain 
of infinite wisdom, goodness, holiness and justice. Sin 



S8 SUNSET ECHOES 

violates the demands of all these, and must be unwise, 
tinholy and unjust. 

It is an act of rebellion against God as the Ruler 
and Father of the human race ; an act of the will of the 
creature, against the Creator. As such, it is against in- 
finite wisdom, infinite justice, holiness and goodness. God 
says: ''All souls are mine,'' and His right to govern all 
he creates and preserves is absolute. Sin despises the 
power and authority which forbids it. God is almighty, 
and He is our Law-giver and Judge. He is such by in- 
herent right, and not by delegated right or power. He 
forbids sin and every act of sin despises the Almighty 
power which forbids it. The sinner refuses to respect 
the authority of God and His rightful claim as Law-giver 
and Judge. He practically challenges God to exert His 
power, and has no more respect for God's power, than if 
He had none. 

Sin not only rejects divine authority, but it brings 
a curse and works ruin, not only to the sinner himself, 
but to all affected by it. While "the law was ordained 
unto life,'' sin changes that which tends to life, so that 
it is made death to the sinner. Violated law kills. Sin 
is such a ruinous, deadly evil, it turns the ministries of 
life into death. 'The soul that sinneth, it shall die." 
*The wages of sin is death.'' "And sin when it is fin- 
ished bringeth forth death." Life and death stand op- 
posed to each other. The spiritual death of the soul sig- 



THE TURPITUDE OF SIN 59 

nifies all the effects of sin, and includes the displeasure 
and curse of God; while spiritual life involves all the 
happiness and well being of existence, with the favor and 
blessing of God. 

The vileness and detestable character of sin is seen in 
that it is an act of the basest ingratitude. Ingratitude is 
an odious and unnatural trait of character and many 
break friendship for life by it. The greater the good- 
ness bestowed and the favors received, the baser the in- 
gratitude. God is our Creator, our Father, our Preserv- 
er and Redeemer, and His bounties cannot be numbered. 
They exceed our comprehension. 

Looking upon ungrateful mankind, God exclaims in 
amazement: ''Hear, O heavens, and give ear O earth; 
. . . I have nourished and brought up children, and 
they have rebelled against me. The ox knoweth his own- 
er and the ass his master's crib. . . but my people do 
not consider." ''A son honoreth his father, but if I be a 
Father where is mine honor?'' 

God infinitely abhors sin, it is ''that abominable thing," 
which His soul hates; and which is the most hateful, 
offensive, and ruinous thing in the world. The sinner 
stabs the hand that created, sustains and blesses him, and 
evinces an ingratitude as black as hell. 

Sin is a practical rejection of God's mercy. Mercy 
is a disposition to pardon crime, and the sinner under the 
guilt of violated law, must have mercy or perish. While 



60 SUNSET ECHOES 

he is condemned and exposed to the curse of God, through 
the atonement mercy is provided and offered; but sin 
rejects and insults the God of mercy and crucifies the 
Son of God afresh. This is done while without the 
mercy, which sin rejects, he must perish forever. It is in 
view of this aspect of sin that our Lord asks: *'How 
can ye being evil, escape the damnation of hell?'' Sin 
is moral suicide. ''He that sinneth against God wrong- 
eth his own soul." 

Sin involves enormous guilt as a violation of obHga- 
tion. The guilt or turpitude of an action is equal to the 
amount of obligation violated. Our obligations to God 
may be estimated in several ways. They must be equal 
to our dependence upon Him; but our dependence upon 
Him is absolute and entire, and always has been, is now, 
and eternally will be. ''In Him we live, and move and have 
our being." "By Him all things exist," and as John 
Wesley says, "Without his preserving power and hand 
all things would sink into its primitive nothing." His 
claims upon our obedience, must be equal to this depend- 
ence. 

Again, our obligations to God, are equal to the bless- 
ings we receive from Him. God is a fountain of infinite 
benevolence to the universe and is the source and author 
of all blessings. His beneficence is infinite, and the bless- 
ings bestowed upon us are beyond our computation or 
comprehension. They include all the good we ever have 



THE TURPITUDE OF SIN 6l 

had, or now have, or ever will have. What then must 
be the extent of our obHgations to the infinite Giver of all 
blessings ? 

The demerit of sin is in proportion to the dignity and 
character of God insulted by sin. ''How much sorer pun- 
ishment, suppose ye, shall he be thought worthy, who 
hath trodden under foot the Son of God, and hath done 
despite to the spirit of grace." 

The inherent malignity of sin is seen in this treat- 
ment of God, w^ho is blasphemed, slandered, and insulted 
by the profane and atheistic of all classes. It denies His 
existence, it reviles His character, it spurns His author- 
ity and disobeys His laws. If we were treated as God 
is treated we could not find words to express our abhor- 
rence and detestation of such conduct. 

The enormity of sin and the exceeding sinfulness of 
sin is seen in its self-perpetuating power — it is infectious, 
increasing in nature, and paralyzing in power all vir- 
tuous principles. It fixes habits of vice and makes wrong 
doing easy and natural, and renders a perpetual course 
of wickedness more and more certain. It quickens the 
susceptibility to temptation, it tends to overthrow all gov- 
ernment and bring the authority of God into contempt. 
All sin, which is lawlessness, tends to universal lawless- 
ness. In a word, sin tends to %miversal damnation. 

The evil and wickedness of sin appear also in the 
manner in which God regards and treats it. If we turn 



62 SUNSET ECHOES 

to His word, we read : ''O, do not this abominable thing 
which I hate/' *The way of the wicked is an abomina- 
tion to the Lord/' The whole Bible is against sin, and 
its grand object is to lead men to avoid it and save them 
from it. 

Look at His threatenings : ''The wrath of God is re- 
vealed from heaven against all ungodliness and un- 
righteousness of men." 'The Lord is angry with the 
wicked every day." "The wicked shall be turned into 
hell with all the nations which forget God." "Tribulation 
and anguish, indignation and wrath upon every soul ot 
man that doeth evil." If sin is a trifle and not a deadly, 
fearful wrong, why does God thus threaten the sinner ? 

The way He regards sin is seen in His works and 
in His treatment of sinners. The whole history of divine 
providence is a war against sin. He spared not the an- 
gels that sinned. He drove Adam and Eve out of Eden 
because they sinned, and their sin has changed the whole 
current of human nature for six thousand years, and cor- 
rupted the whole race. Because of sin, as the whole race 
had corrupted its way, God destroyed the world with a 
flood. He sent fire from heaven and burned the cities 
of the plain because of their sins. He opened the ground 
and swallowed up thousands of His chosen people be- 
cause they sinned. He has put the seal of His displeasure 
upon all the leading sins of wicked men, and hates sin 
now as much as He ever did. 



THE TURPITUDE OF SIN 63 

It should not be forgotten that He is as much dis- 
pleased with lying now as when He killed Ananias and 
Sapphira for lying. He is as much offended with Sab- 
bath breaking as when He ordered men stoned to death 
for Sabbath desecration. He is as angry to-day with 
murder as when He put the mark on Cain and sent him 
out a vagabond in all the earth. He is as much opposed 
to covetousness as He was when He opened the ground 
and swallowed up Achan and his whole family. Licen- 
tousness is just as offensive to Him as it was when He 
burnt Sodom. Disobedience was no more sinful when 
God killed Lot's wife than it is now. Unbelief is as 
ruinous as it was when Christ said : 'Tie that believeth 
not shall be damned/' or when the ten unbelieving spies 
were struck dead for their unbelief. 

The same is true of pride — which is as hateful to 
God as when He smote Herod because of his pride. Well 
may the apostle declare: ''It is a fearful thing to fall 
into the hands of the living God.'' Why all this, if sin is 
not exceeding sinful, and the foe of God and of man? 
It is the cause of all the evil in our world. It has ruined 
and degraded humanity, and what remains of our race 
that is praiseworthy are only the broken pillars of a once 
beautiful fabric. The corrupting power of sin has made 
man's desires sensual, his will perverse, his understand- 
ing dark, his conscience seared, his memory treacherous, 



64 SUNSET ECHOES 

and so alienated his affections that he is estranged from 
God, and his nature is degraded and fallen. 

All our diseases and ailments and sufferings are the 
results of sin, actual or original, direct or indirect. This 
is true physically, intellectually and morally. It is in- 
separably connected with, and is the essence of all treach- 
ery, deception, cruelty, fear, fraud, oppression, murder 
and death. It has made our world a vale of tears and a 
field of blood. 

We see why sin justly exposes to the wrath of God, 
as each sin combines all this violation of law, rejection of 
mercy, contempt of power, violation of obligations, base 
ingratitude and human degredation and ruin. It offers 
the greatest insult that can be made to the majesty of the 
great and glorious God, and is evil and only evil, root and 
branch, bud, blossom and fruit, a ruinous and abominable 
thing which has kindled a fire in God's "anger which shall 
burn forever." 



SINS OF OMISSION 65 



SINS OF OMISSION. 

Theological writers usually classify sins into those 
of commission and those of omission; meaning, by the 
former, overt acts of transgression, or the doing what 
should not be done ; and by the latter, not doing what we 
ought to do, and not being what we ought to be. 

This distinction stands related to a corresponding dis- 
tinction in the moral law ; since this both enjoins and for- 
bids — requires some things to be done, and forbids the 
doing of certain other things. Neglect to obey its requi- 
sitions is a sin of omission; doing w^hat it prohibits is a 
sin of commission. 

Each of these classes of sin includes an internal state 
of mind, even when it results in no corresponding con- 
duct, as well as our external doings or failures to do. In- 
deed, the only real sin is in the mind ; and it may be mani- 
fested externally in natural development, or it may not 
be. In the latter case, it is none the less sin. 

Most, if not all men commit more sins of omission 
than of commission ; and in many cases the sins of omis- 
sion are the more aggravated. There cannot be a more 
grievous sin, than not loving God; and there cannot be 
one more certainly, terribly and justly damning than not 
accepting Christ as a Savior, 

In Matt. XXV., Christ represents the wicked at the 



66 SUNSET ECHOES 

final judgment as doomed to hell because they had not 
ministered to him in the person of the hungry, the thirsty, 
the stranger, the naked, the sick and the imprisoned. 

It was not what they had done, that made and evinced 
their character, but what they had not done. They had not 
shown love to him, nor to his suffering friends. They 
evinced that they neither loved God nor man. Hence 
their righteous doom among the enemies of all good. 

What a lesson the Savior here presents by this heart- 
searching representation ! Oh ! let us each examine, and 
see how our account stands of things not done, — the hun- 
gry not fed, the naked not clothed, the sick not visited, and 
the poor and needy not ministered unto. 

There is a vast amount of self-deception among sin- 
ners and many professed Christians, the result, in a great 
measure, of not considering this aspect of sin. 

Multitudes, all about us, have no just sense of their 
own moral turpitude. Why ? Because they make no ac- 
count of sins of omission. They do not look at the law 
of God, requiring them to love God supremely, and their 
fellow-men as themselves; and hence they see not their 
chief guilt. As to sins of commission, they find them- 
selves by no means among the most scandalous sinners of 
the race. Hence, the ruinous estimate of themselves, 
which deludes their guilty souls. 

Then, what a dense throng of merely nominal Chris- 
tians, whose outward Christianity is at least so fair as 



SINS OF OMISSION 6/ 

to subject them to no church discipUne or censure; but 
oh ! the things not done, — the fervent prayers not offered ; 
the crosses not borne ; the self-denial and sacrifice for 
Christ not made; the daily efforts to save souls not put 
forth ; the thousand nameless testimonies of love to Christ, 
which burst forth at countless points where that love 
really burns within, which are not given. 

How will these deeds and duties not done rise up at 
last and testify against these professors in that day, when 
God shall judge the world in righteousness, by Jesus 
Christ, and put an end to every hope that is not eternal ! 

The precious doctrine of entire sanctification by no 
means overlooks sins of omission. On the contrary, it 
seeks to set the heart right, and bring it into the perma- 
nent attitude of loving God supremely and our fellow- 
beings impartially. 

Perfect love, as required in the Bible, is that very state 
in which the inner spirit worships God, and loves its 
neighbor as itself. 



68 Sunset echoes 



DEATH DOES NOT SANCTIFY THE SOUL. 

Practically, multitudes in the church say they 
expect to be sanctified by the death of the body. They 
may not proclaim it in words, but their actions speak 
plainly. The greater part of professed Christians defer 
their full sanctification until death, while death itself has 
no more to do with their sanctification than with their 
pardon or justification. This mistaken idea is fruitful of 
nothing but evil, and millions are being deluded by it. 
All through the church are multitudes who are not en- 
tirely sanctified, and are looking forward to death for the 
completion of the work and their fitness for heaven. They 
are neglecting present duty and privilege, and presum- 
ing on a ruinous fallacy. The Bible nowhere states or 
even intimates that death sanctified the soul. It nowhere 
encourages Christians to look to death, or to rely upon 
it, for a completion of the gracious work commenced in 
their heart at regeneration. Where do we find the least 
intimation that Christ and the Apostles placed any re- 
liance upon death for Christian sanctification? I repeat, 
where ? 

While the sacred writers speak often of the means, 
the agencies, and the time of sanctification, they never 
name death as either its means, its agent or its time. 
Will those who are deferring their complete sanctification 



DEATH DOES NOT SANCTIFY THE SOUL 69 

until death note this most ominous fact? If death sanc- 
tifies the soul, or finishes the work of sanctification al- 
ready begun, then it, at least, is partially our savior ; and 
the effect of sin (for ''death is by sin'') becomes the 
means of finally destroying it — that is, the effect of a 
cause can react upon its cause and destroy it. This would 
be a philosophical absurdity. 

Death, in its very nature and circumstances, is en- 
tirely unpropitious for the work of sanctification. If, 
as the Bible teaches, sanctification involves human agency, 
the free intelligent action of the mind, ''sanctified by 
faith," "through the truth,'' death is no time for such a 
process in cleansing the soul. Weakness and distraction of 
mind are the ordinary accompaniments of physical disso- 
lution, and unfit it for calm and intelligent action. If 
death sanctifies the soul then the work is removed from 
the ground of moral agency, and the Christian has no 
responsibility in the matter. This would nullify all the 
precepts requiring human agency in obtaining personal 
holiness. That we have a personal responsibility in se- 
curing our entire sanctification, is as clear as that we 
have responsibility in our justification or partial sanctifi- 
cation. 

In so far as we can see, there is not a shadow of evi- 
dence that dissolving the connection between the soul and 
body will produce any effect upon the character, or moral 
condition of the soul. The change produced by death is 



70 SUNSET ECHOES 

in our physical state and mode of being, and a mere 
physical change of state, cannot relieve the soul of its 
depravity, which is developed in its pride, unbelief, sel- 
fishness, corrupt lusts and sinward inclination. Sancti- 
fication is change of character, and change of charao- 
ter involves human agency, and is God's w^ork, is by 
grace, through faith and moral means. 

Many appear to hold the old pagan dogma that the 
body is the seat of sin, and that depravity pertains only 
to the body, and when the body dies, as the soul leaves 
the body it will be free from depravity. That the body 
has suffered by the fall and is degenerated and possessed 
of deranged appetites and propensities, making it an 
"instrument of unrighteousness,'' is admitted ; but Chris- 
tian sanctification has less regard to the body than the 
soul, which is the seat of inbred sin. The carnal 
mind, anger, covetousness, impatience, hatred land all 
filthiness of the spirit, belong to the soul and not to the 
body. The death of the body makes no moral change in 
the soul. 

*Tn the place where the tree falleth, there it shall be," 
for ''He that is unjust, let him be unjust still; and he 
that is filthy, let him be filthy still ; and he that is 
righteous, let him be righteous still; and he that is holy, 
let him be holy still." 



CONSCIENCE AND DUTY 7I 



CONSCIENCE AND DUTY. 

It is not wise to always make our feelings a guide in 
deciding our duty. Impressions are made upon our minds 
by various agencies and objects, and they are not always 
safe to follow. In many instances they have led to great 
blunders, and sometimes to rank fanaticism. 

"I felt it my duty to do thus and thus,'' has been of- 
ten presented as an excuse for doing what has not been 
in harmony with either enlightened reason or the Word 
of God. When our feelings prompt us to do what is un- 
sustained by reason, or the law of love and the Word of 
God, they should not be followed. The more nearly the 
soul presses to Christ, and seeks divine light and guid- 
ance, the more clearly the law of love and the Word of 
God will shine upon the mind, and the less likely the soul 
to go astray. 

There are several rules of action which we think are 
always safe. When our convictions of duty are strong 
and clear, and are in harmony with our best judgment, 
the Word of God, and the law of love, we should always 
follow them. To follow such convictions, though they 
may not involve perfect wisdom, is right and safe. Hu- 
manity is not required to have perfect wisdom, but is re- 
quired to do its best, to know its duty, and possess right 
convictions, and then be governed by them. 



72 SUNSET ECHOES 

A mere impulse of feeling that a given course is duty, 
is not itself a rule to guide us, and should be sifted and 
tried by the Word of God and our enlightened judgment. 
God has given us the Bible, the illuminating Spirit, and 
our reason to guide us in the path of duty. He does not 
require us to do unreasonable things that contravene our 
judgment. The illumination and guidance of the Holy 
Spirit is always in harmony with the dictates of a godly 
judgment, with what is right and wise and best and duty, 
in view of all known facts and circumstances, and what is 
in harmony with the Bible. Reason is given us to exer- 
cise, in the light of the Bible and the Holy Spirit, in de- 
ciding our duty. 

Impulses sometimes are from Satan. In this world 
we are subject to more or less Satanic influence. Dr. 
Payson tells us he sometimes felt a strong impulse to do, 
and do, and do, which was opposed to his cool judgment; 
and which, in yielding to, nearly killed him by overdoing, 
as he at first took the impulse to be from God. At last 
he concluded it was not like God to overwork His serv- 
ants, and very like the devil to kill them by overwork. 



A BAPTISM OF LOVE 73 



A BAPTISM OF LOVE. 

Love to God and to man is the dominating idea of 
the Christian religion. It is the controlHng power in all 
true piety, and without it the Christian profession is as 
''sounding brass and a tinkling cymbal/' Love is the 
inspiration and ruling influence in all acceptable devotion. 
While salvation is many-sided, this is the ''central idea'' 
and the principal thing. There is submission, adoration, 
illumination, regeneration, adoption, faith and hope ; 
but love has the preeminence . "Above all these things 
put on love, which is the bond of perfectness." 

In personal salvation nothing can be a substitute for 
love, as it is the distinguishing feature of the Christian 
life. "Love is the fulfilling (the substance and fulfill- 
ment) of the law." It is the root principle of all evan- 
gelical obedience ; and he who loves God with all his heart 
will obey Him with all his power. 

Love to God and evangelical obedience are insepara- 
ble. This is stated in a variety of w^ays: "And this is 
love, that we walk after His commandments." "For this 
is the love of God, that we keep His commandments." 
"He that hath My commandments, and keepeth them, he 
it is that loveth Me." "Whoso keepeth His words, in 
him verily is the love of God perfected." 

"Pure love reigning alone in the heart," Mr. Wesley 



74 SUNSET ECHOES 

said, ''is the whole of Christian perfection.'' ''Now the 
end of the commandment is charity (love) out of a pure 
heart." 

This love is the godly disposition of the pious heart. 
The realm of its operation is the whole soul, mind, and 
heart, subordinating everything to itself. It abides with 
the Christian, and becomes interwoven with his whole 
life. It is not an occasional impulse, but is to abide and 
pervade all his activities. Possessed in its fullness, it 
is a soul-filling, soul-controlling, and life-directing power 
— the supreme element in the life and conduct. Entire 
sanctification involves the fullness of this love, a disposi- 
tion and abiding state of complete devotion to God. 

This love is begotten or imparted by the Holy Spirit, 
and hence is received by a baptism. "The love of God 
is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit which is 
given unto us.'' The blessed Holy Ghost is the efficient 
agent in the whole work of personal salvation, whether it 
be conviction, illumination, regeneration, or purification. 
After the work of salvation has been wrought, and after 
the heart is fully cleansed from all pollution, the influ- 
ences of the Holy Spirit are needed to keep the living 
flame of love burning in our hearts. 

This baptism of the Spirit of Christ and of love is 
usually preceded by self-abasement, spiritual poverty, and 
a distressing sense of spiritual deficiency. When the soul 
is humbled before God, emptied of self, and hungers and 



A BAPTISM OF LOVE 75 

thirsts after righteousness, it will be filled with love to 
God and humanity. 

How this is needed in these days of trial, danger, and 
responsibility! How it would relieve all disturbing col- 
lisions, nervous irritability, and sectarian distrust in the 
Church! It is like Christ and heaven to have the soul 
full of love. O, when shall a full baptism of Chris- 
tian love pervade the whole Church? What mighty re- 
vivals would break out in our places of worship ! How 
sectarian antipathies would melt away ! Such a baptism 
would blend all who truly love the Savior into the most 
tender Christian sympathy, and difficulties between 
brethren would be happily adjusted. 

O, for a general baptism of love, to fill with peace and 
bless the Church of God! 



76 SUNSET ECHOES 



THE REST OF FAITH. 

''For we which have believed do enter into rest." Heb. 

4:3- 

We read in the Scriptures, "A rest remaineth for the 
people of God." Christ said, '1 will give you rest," and 
''ye shall find rest unto your souls." 'The work of 
righteousness (says the Prophet) shall be peace, and the 
effect of righteousness, quietness and assurance forever." 
This soul-rest of a believer commences here, and now, and 
will be consummated in eternity. Sin is a disturbing ele- 
ment, "There is no peace saith my God to the wicked." 
Unregenerate humanity is like "the troubled sea." Our 
Lord came into the world as the ''Prince of Peace/' He 
was heralded with the joyous acclaim, "Peace on earth 
and good will to men." "Being justified by faith, we have 
peace with God." "Peace in believing." "My peace I 
give unto you." We inquire : — 

I. What is this soul rest? 

1. It is not a state in which we do not sympathize 
with the joys and sorrows of others. The more fully 
saved and perfect the soul-rest, the more intense and ac- 
tive are all legitimate sympathies of the soul. 

2. It is not ^ state of exemption from physical, or 
mental suffering — "The servant is not above his Lord." 



THE REST OF FAITH yy 

This rest is, however, a source of comfort and allevia- 
tion in the suf5ferings of Hfe. 

3. It is not a rest of inaction, or a state of inglorious 
ease. It is not stagnation or death, but life. Life and 
action are inseparable. The earth rests on its orbit, and 
yet moves with inconceivable velocity — out of its orbit 
it would be disordered, restless and ruined. 

4. This soul-rest, in the justified and regenerate, is 
a state of freedom from the reigning power of sin. The 
minimum of salvation, is salvation from sinning. *'We 
know that whosoever is born of God sinneth not." ''Who- 
soever is born of God, doth not commit sin ; for his seed 
remaineth in him, and he cannot sin because he is born 
of God." "For sin shall not have dominion over you." 
"Whosover abideth in Him sinneth not." These Scrip- 
tures teach that to be born again and savingly united to 
Christ, is incompatible with present actual sinning. All 
truly regenerate people have no disposition to sin ; their 
controlling disposition has been changed, and they are 
inclined and disposed to love and obey God. Some of the 
rudiments of the old carnal disposition may remain in 
those not entirely sanctified, but the power of sin has been 
so broken, that the predominant disposition of the soul 
has been changed, and Christ's spirit rules in the heart. 

5. In those fully saved it is a state of rest irom all 
the jarring discords of indwelling sin. The disturbing 
elements having been removed, all internal conflict ceases. 



78 SUNSET ECHOES 

The soul has peace ivith itself and in itself. 'The peace of 
God rules in the heart. 

6. This rest is a state of sanctified adjustment of all 
the powers and affections of the soul. There is divine 
order and internal harmony. All conflict between the 
will and the conscience and affections has ceased. 'The 
peace of God, which passeth all understanding" (or as 
Dean Alford has it ''surpasseth all understanding''), 
''shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Je- 
sus.'' It is a pure tranquillity of spirit. 

7. It is a gracious soul-rest from the former servi- 
tude to its old propensities. Carnal nature, "the body of 
sin," having been destroyed, there is freedom from all 
the clamoring "lusts of the flesh." "But ye are not in 
the flesh, but in the Spirit; if so be the Spirit of God 
dwell in you." 

8. This rest is one of blissful assurance. All doubt 
or uncertainty respecting the divine favor or the soul's 
salvation is excluded. "Perfect love casts out fear." "He 
that feareth is not made perfect in love." "The work of 
righteousness shall be peace, and the effect of righteous- 
ness, quietness and assurance forever^ "Thou shalt keep 
him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on Thee, be- 
cause he trusteth in Thee." 

9. This soul-rest is one of permanent assurance in 
respect to all our interests, temporal and eternal. If a 
blind son can trust his mother to prepare his food with- 



THE REST OF FAITH 79 

out the least fear of her poisoning him, or trust a father 
to lead him with as much confidence as the best eyes 
could inspire, may not the child of God trust the infinite 
love, power and wisdom of Christ? If a mother, father, 
wife or husband can be trusted without a disturbing 
doubt, may not a Christian rest in perfect repose upon the 
bosom of the God of truth and love ? 

ID. This soul-rest is a state of full satisfaction in 
God as the changeless center of moral gravitation. 'This 
God is my God forever and ever/' The soul's chief 
good, ''Whom have I in heaven but thee?" When our 
blessed Savior stood up and cried on the last great day 
of the feast : 'Tf any man thirst, let Him come unto me 
and drink,'' He called upon all men to drink at the foun- 
tain of his own boundless felicity. He desires His chil- 
dren to enjoy what He enjoys. "My peace I give unto 
you." A peace like the ocean's depth, far beneath all 
storms and forever undisturbed. "These things have I 
spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you, and 
that your joy might be full." This completes the climax. 
Christ's peace is full of mighty love and power. It was 
his last, his best, and his dying legacy to believers. "We 
which have believed do enter into rest." 

This rest, or peace, cannot be perfect in the soul un- 
til all the discordant elements of indwelling sin are 
cleansed from the heart. Perfect purity precedes perfect 
peace. Perfect submission precedes perfect soul rest. 



8o SUNSET ECHOES 

Perfect love excludes all evil tempers'. The fullness of 
the Spirit secures a subdued and regulated sensibility. 
'The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, 
gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance.'' Ev- 
ery believer is under obligation to God, to himself, and to 
the world to fully believe and enter into this rest without 
delay. 



DIVINE VISITATIONS. 

We have heard of ''angels' visits." Though we have 
had no experience in this regard, yet we can easily con- 
ceive somewhat of what they are. What an era in our 
existence would such a visitation be! It would doubt- 
less make us wiser and better during the remainder of 
our life. 

But what must it be to have a visit from God ! Who 
of us has had this experience? Who can tell what it is? 
There are some who have had this experience — ^^Thou 
visitest himy Those who have had these divine visita- 
tions can tell us something, though they cannot tell us all 
about them. 

In such visitations, there is certainly a direct inter- 
communion of mind with mind, between the creature and 
God, of which the soul is just as conscious, as it is of 
its own operations. It is clear, from the Bible and from 
experience, that the soul may have certain and distinct 
apprehensions of the presence and manifestation of God. 



DIVINE VISITATIONS 8l 

It is one thing for the soul to have apprehension that it 
is the constant object of omnific inspection, and a very 
different thing to have the high and lofty ''One that in- 
habiteth eternity/' descend to visit us in direct intercom- 
munion with our minds — to be the conscious subjects 
of His blessed presence and communion. ''I will draw 
nigh unto you." ''Ye shall seek me and find me,'' ''I 
will manifest myself unto you.'" 

The effect of such divine visitations, is the most pre- 
cious conceivable. In such the cup of blessedness is full. 
The river of life rises in the soul and bears it onward 
into an ocean of peace and blessedness where it finds 
neither shore nor bottom. 

These visits have a transforming power upon the 
heart and character. New life and vigor are at once 
diffused throughout the soul. After these visits the mind 
has a sense of God's presence, and a realization of His 
truth and faithfulness, and such an assurance of His 
love as it never had before. 

Reader, should your soul receive one such visitation 
you would be a new man the remainder of your earthly 
pilgrimage. In that visit you would learn more of God 
than you ever learned before ; and your sense of His 
presence and perfections, and of the infinite fullness of 
His grace and love would become much more distinct 
and vivid. 

You will then realize an entirely new relation to God 



82 SUNSET ECHOES 

in prayer. Then prayer to you will not be speaking to an 
impalpable, imaginary being, but to an omnipresent mind. 
You will know what it is to ''speak to God face to face,'' 
and to plead with Him with an importunity, which His 
presence and grace alone can inspire. Then you will 
have ''power with God,'' and His promises will be all 
"yea and amen in Christ Jesus." 

The Bible will then become to you a new book. In 
reading it will seem the voice of God to your soul. It 
will become spirit and life, and a medium of communion 
with Him, in which you will behold, as in a glass, His 
image and glory. 

Such visitations break the charm of this world, they 
spoil earthly pleasures by fixing the soul's supreme de- 
light on Christ and heavenly things. Christ becomes to 
the soul, "the rose of Sharon," "the lily of the valley," 
"the king in his beauty," "the brightness of the Fath- 
er's glory," "the chief among ten thousand," and "the 
One altogether lovely." These visitations secure a re- 
ligious standpoint, where the charming glories of "Im- 
manuel, God with us," are poured upon the soul. 

Such are some of the results of these divine visita- 
tions. If the reader asks, "On what conditions God will 
condescend to visit me ?" we answer, "You must be hum- 
ble and contrite in spirit, and tremble at the word of 
God." God must be sought with all the heart. With 
deep penitence and contrition for past transgressions. 



WALKING ALONE WITH JESUS. 8^ 

you must humble yourself before God, and by consecra- 
tion and faith descend into the fountain of cleansing 
opened at Jerusalem ''for sin and uncleanness/' and 
there become ''pure in heart/' Then reader you will 
*'see God/' Then, God will visit you. Then the Father 
will love you; He and Christ will come and make their 
abode with you. 

Will you take this subject to your closet, and there 
think upon it, and pray over it in the presence of Him 
who is "mindful of the sons of men and visits them?'' 
When He abides with you, and you continue in His love, 
"God will become your everlasting light, and the days of 
your mourning will be ended.'' 



WALKING ALONE WITH JESUS. 

It is comparatively an easy thing to be a Christian 
when the multitude bow in adoration at Jesus' feet, and 
it requires no great energy of spirit to consent to be 
identified with the followers of Christ, when the multi- 
tude follow, crying, "Hosanna to the Son of David." It 
was a very pleasant thing to be a disciple amid the beam- 
ing glories of the Mount of Transfiguration. But when 
we are required to follow Jesus, "without the camp, 
bearing the reproach," when the most of the world seem 
to have turned against him, that is quite another thing. 

Almost any one can live religion in a time of general 
revival, when multitudes are rallying to the cross, and 



84 SUNSET ECHOES 

one seems almost irresistibly wafted along by the breath 
of prayer, and the burst of praise ; but when the search- 
ing, trying, sifting time is come, it requires grace and 
nerve and sterling worth to stand the fire. 

How pure and free the moral atmosphere that blows 
in gales of grace over our "feasts of tabernacles" in the 
leafy grove? How easy then to throw off all restraint, 
and with hearts refreshed and gladdened by showers of 
redeeming mercy, to worship God. Oft have we felt to 
exclaim, as we have mingled in these hallowed associa- 
tions : — 

"My willing soul would stay, 

In such a frame as this, 
And sit and sing herself away, 

To everlasting bliss." 

But these seasons do not always continue, a few 
brief days and the hundreds of happy faces that greet 
us are scattered far and wide. We must go out to grap- 
ple with stern realities. Difficulties soon loom in fear- 
ful array, testing our utmost fortitude and grace. We 
meet with little sympathy from the wicked world or 
from a faithless Church. The masses have no eyes to 
see the true beauties and importance of spiritual things — 
no heart to appreciate the workings of the Holy Ghost. 

If in the fullness of our hearts, we seek to magnify 
the ''riches of grace'' by testifying how freely ''the blood 
cleanseth,'' we may not expect universal credence in our 
testimony, nor universal sympathy with our position. 



WALKING ALONE WITH JESUS. 85 

Suspicious glances, and half suppressed (if not loudly 
proclaimed) opinions about ''high professions," will in- 
dicate the popular sentiment, and teach us that there is 
something more than imagination in the idea of standing 
alone with Jesus. 

We are social beings; and we easily see the tendency 
to mutual dependence in an unlawful degree. There is 
an important sense in which every disciple must stand 
and fight, and fall alone. The stupendous destinies of our 
immortal exis-tence hang trembling over the decisions of 
our own individual will. Alone we must pass the shady 
valley of the tomb, and alone go up to receive the change- 
less sentence of our final Judge. God and our solitary 
souls will be the only parties. 

We must walk alone with Jesus, and though human 
friendships should all be sundered, and the millions of 
earth should constitute one unbroken line of opposition, 
hurling the darts of hellish hate, and pouring out the 
bitterest anathemas on our heads, we are to walk alone 
with Jesus, and ''smile at Satan's rage.'' 

There is such a thing as being weaned from this de- 
lusive world, and shut up with God. Human sympathy 
may be sweetly soothing to our aching hearts, but it can 
never meet the deepest wants of our nature. In a very 
deep and peculiar sense we must be saved from each 
other and walk alone with Jesus. 



86 SUNSET ECHOES 



THE CHRISTIAN PASTOR'S PESPONSI- 
BIUTIES. 

When a people receive a man who has been set apart 
to preach the gospel, and make him their spiritual watch- 
man, placing him in their midst as a sentinel against 
impending danger, they lay on him solemn responsibili- 
ties. These responsibilities God lays upon every pastor, 
who, by his Providence and Spirit, he calls into any field 
of pastoral labor. 

The spiritual pastor assumes the care of souls. The 
thousand influences which must affect their moral state 
he must study. He must know his people — not their 
names only, or their general character, or their place 
and weight in the social world, but he must know their 
moral state and history, and everything that affects their 
spiritual life and progress; else, how can he give each 
a portion in due season. How else can he be their spir- 
itual guide? 

Of the hundreds who constitute his charge, many are 
in youth, and he has the responsibility of guarding the 
influences under which their characters are formed for 
life and for eternity. The influences they exert upon each 
other — which help to develop their characters, and have 
much to do therewith — he must not sleep over. 

A large number are more advanced in life, but are 



THE CHRISTIAN PASTOR'S RESPONSIBILITIES 8/ 

Still in their sins. All the Sabbaths and sermons they 
have enjoyed; all the afflictions and all the mercies, and 
all the revivals they have passed through, have hitherto 
failed to subdue their hearts. They are only the more 
hardened. How often will the faithful pastor ponder 
their cases one by one, and ask himself what new means 
can he employ, or what new effort can he put forth by 
which he may hope to reach each man's heart and con- 
science and save his soul. 

There will be some in the bosom of the church, over 
whom his soul yearns with tenderest compassion, for he 
fears they have but a name to live. ^'Oh,'' he asks, ''must 
I lead them again and again to the communion table, take 
their children in my arms and dedicate them to God, and 
follow them through the sick chamber to the grave, and 
have no more evidence than I now have, that they are 
God's children T' Alas ! what a trial is this. How many 
a pastor's heart has ached under it! 

Sometimes a pastor is summoned to the dying bed- 
side of one of his charge, on whom the hand of God has 
fallen, and the dying man is in his sins. His heart would 
cry out, ''Oh, if he might spare me the bitterness of this 
scene! Must I go and see a lost soul torn away from 
among my own people? Have I given him every warn- 
ing that I might have given, and plied every means I 
could for his salvation as I should have done ? Must he 
die under the displeasure of God, and must I meet hirn 



55 SUNSET ECHOES 

at the bar of God and answer there to the responsibiU- 
ties of my pastorate?" 

These are fearful responsibilities. When we see them 
in their full extent, and in their bearing on the world to 
come, no wonder we cry out, *'Who is sufficient for these 
things?'' 

If there were not some redeeming and sustaining con- 
siderations, no man with his eyes open would ever as- 
sume such responsibilities as these. No wise man, with- 
out positive convictions of duty, would make himself 
liable to such pains and penalties for unfaithfulness. It 
involves such ceaseless cares, and trusts of such bound- 
less magnitude, if there were not something to sustain 
and remunerate the pastor beyond the honor which men 
award, or the salary they pay — no man would be found 
to assume them. 

But there is something beyond — infinitely beyond 
these inducements and supports. Jesus Christ has been 
a pastor himself watching for souls, and entering most 
wonderfully into their sympathies and wants. He knows 
the heart of the faithful pastor therefore, and will not 
be very far away when his soul yearns with parental and 
pastoral solicitude over immortal souls. 

Christ has gone to his reward, and every faithful pas- 
tor shall receive his reward when he has finished his 
work ; and besides, He will sustain and bless us in our 
work. The tears we shed, fall not unnoticed by him. 



HAVE ANY OF THE RULERS BELIEVED ON HIM ? 89 

The prayers and agonies and labors of the faithful minis- 
ter shall not be in vain. They, like their Master, shall 
see of the travail of their soul and be satisfied. 

Then let us, dear brethren, feel that while our work 
is arduous, it is also glorious; and though full of care 
and toil, it will be full of fruit to the glory of God. 



''HAVE ANY OF THE RULERS BELIEVED ON 

HIM ? 

There is no royal way to the favor of God or to 
heaven. God is no respecter of persons. Human dis- 
tinctions are mainly confined to man, and to this world, 
and human depravity has much to do with them. 

The question at the head of this article, shows the 
rule by which some people judge of religion — ''Have any 
of the rulers believed on Him?'' 

A due regard for the judgment and opinions of the 
great and the learned, we suppose no reasonable person 
will question, and, yet, too much dependence upon the 
opinions of great men, so-called, respecting the experi- 
mental truths of religion is not wise. There is a better, 
and a safer way. The Savior said — ''If any man will 
do His will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it 
be of God.'' We may know by experience, respecting 
Christian holiness, "whether any good thing can come 
out of Nazareth," "Come and see.'' 

The religion of our Lord Jesus Christ has been to 



90 SUNSET ECHOES 

a great extent rejected by the rulers of this world, nor 
has God especially consulted the wisdom, power and 
wealth of men in establishing His Church. 

A life of mortification, self-denial, and humility does 
not comport with the inclinations of those who will have 
their portion in this life. Hence, it is no uncommon thing 
for those elevated in their relative position, and honored 
by men, to possess a strong repugnance to self-denial 
and full obedience to the will of God. Such a course 
comes in conflict with pride, dignity, self-importance, and 
love of applause. It is very natural for those in author- 
ity, or of noble birth, or possessed of wealth and rank 
to place a high estimate on themselves and disparage 
others. Such are inclined to be impatient under re- 
straint or contradiction, and to imagine because they are 
great in some things, they are great and wise in all things. 
This is a very common mistake. We should be wise in 
our discrimination concerning the greatness of great 
men. Most of great men, are great only in some things, 
while in other things they are on a level with, or below 
mediocrity. 

Evangelical obedience and faithfulness to God, neces- 
sitates a submissive, humble, child-like spirit. It was in 
view of these things, that Christ, declared His Father 
had hid many spiritual things ''from the wise and pru- 
dent, and had revealed them unto babes,'' and the apos- 
tle — ''Not many wise men after the flesh, not many 



HAVE AKY OF THE RULERS BELIEVED ON HIM? 9I 

mighty, not many noble, are called ; but God hath chosen 
the foolish things of the world to confound the wise ; and 
God hath chosen the weak things of the world to con- 
found the things which are mighty; and base things of 
the world, and things which are despised, hath God 
chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to naught 
things that are; that no flesh should glory in His pres- 
ence/' Pride and contempt, standing in the way of can- 
dor, argument and truth, have kept many a man out of 
Christ. 

The great mass of God's people have always been 
more from the humble walks of life, than from the higher 
classes, or the elevated ranks of life. True virtue or 
excellence, sincerity and amiability, honesty and purity 
are usually found with those in humble life. Divine 
grace has been most displayed in reforming and purifying 
the lives of the common people, and especially the ignor- 
ant, the vicious, the weak and the abandoned. 

It has been no uncommon thing for the proud and 
haughty to oppose Christian holiness, by ridiculing its 
friends as poor, and ignorant, weak and credulous. Such 
people looking down with contempt upon the deluded 
Methodists, appear to overlook the fact, that God has 
great regard for the common people, the teachable, sim- 
ple and humble, and out of this class has always selected 
most of those who have been His chosen instruments and 
His favored people. 



92 SUNSET ECHOES 

No doctrine of Scripture depends for its success on 
human wisdom or greatness, and the prevalence and in- 
fluence of Christian purity is not dependent on any class 
of men, high or low, great or small, rich or poor. Any 
religious system built on human power, wisdom, or 
wealth will be confounded and brought to naught. It 
is safe only to trust in God. 

We seriously doubt that God is pleased with the sick- 
ening toadyism^ so excessively developed in some of our 
Churches over some supposed great ones. 

This thing appears to be growing among us, and is 
becoming to some of our sister Churches an occasion of 
amusement rather than strengthening their confidence in 
our good sense. Perhaps it would not hurt us as a 
Church to dispense with our toadyism entirely. 

The truth of God, is alike adapted to all classes, and 
it has pleased our Heavenly Father, that the doctrine and 
experience of Christian holiness should commend itself 
to the most profound and loftly intellects, as well as to 
the common mass or ordinary sinners. He has raised up 
among our great men many devoted advocates and faith- 
ful witnesses of this grace. 

The history of Methodism points out many of our 
chief ministers, whom the Church has delighted to honor, 
because they honored God with pure lives, and devotion 
to the doctrine of entire sanctification. Men who be- 
lieved it, preached it, professed it, and lived it; and 



HAVE ANY OF THE RULERS BELIEVED ON HIM? 93 

whose names are as ointment poured forth," and many 
of them though dead, still speak through their works 
for it. 

The Presidency of Wesleyan University has been es- 
pecially blest with this class of men — Wilbur Fisk, 
Stephen Olin and Cyrus D. Foss. 

What a trio of men of God! each through grace 
mighty in Christ, enjoying and standing as witnesses of 
full salvation. 

Dr. Fisk was gloriously sanctified at old Eastham, 
and came back to the University, and walked with the 
sweetness of an angel until God took him. Dr. Olin 
sought a fullness in Christ, away in Italy, and lost self in 
an ocean of love, and confessed to his friends the great 
work of God in his soul. Bishop Foss has walked in 
the sunshine and sweetness of perfect love for years, 
and has often given his personal testimony to this pre- 
cious grace. No minister coming from the sacred walls 
of Wesleyan University ought to give his trumpet any 
uncertain sound in this great central idea of the blessed 
Bible.^ 

We could mention many in these days, who, have 
found this great treasure, and now stand among the 
strongest and most evangelical ministers in the Church 
of God. 

God be praised! a still brighter day is yet to dawn 
upon the Church. The prejudice which has overshad- 



94 SUNSET ECHOES 

owed this subject is being dispelled, and holiness must 
and will triumph. While God is raising up advocates of 
this grace from all classes, and in all Churches, let us 
not forget, our sole dependence is on Him. 

No matter who embraces it, or otherwise, He is our 
dependence, and let us not glory in men. 



THE DEATH OF SAINTS. 

''Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His 
Saints/' 

We are accustomed to speak of Death as ''the king of 
terrors,'' and apart from the teachings of Revelation, we 
could not speak otherwise. God's word pours light into 
the dark grave, and while Christians are not exempt from 
the stroke of mortality, they are saved from the sting of 
death, which is sin. 

God regards the death of saints with profound inter- 
est. 'Trecious in the sight of the Lord is the death of 
His saints." Death introduces the child of God into 
everlasting safety, purity and blessedness. The pious 
dead have run the race which was set before them, and 
reached the goal. They have fought the good fight, and 
the last struggle is over. The sword of the warrior is 
exchanged for the victor's crown. The little vessel, long 
tossed on the stormy sea of temptation and trial, has 
reached the haven, sheltered from every storm. The 
shock of corn is gathered into the heavenly garner. The 



THE DEATH OF SAINTS 95 

sheep so long pursued by the devouring wolf, is now 
safely folded in the arms of the great Shepherd. 

Probation is at an end. The flesh no longer lusts 
against the spirit, and the great battle of life is ended. 
The soul in heaven is established in holiness. No spot 
of guilt can ever defile its conscience again. Even the 
possibility of sinning is forever excluded. Each of the 
glorified bears the beautiful image and moral perfections 
of God, and all radiant with divine luster, will increase 
in glory forever. God dwells among his own, and ''they 
serve him day and night in his temple." Their Sabbath 
never ends, and their worship never languishes. "The 
inhabitants'' of that land ''shall not say, I am sick.'' All 
tears shall be wiped away. "There shall be no more 
death, neither sorrow, nor crying; neither shall there be 
any more pain." "They shall hunger no more, neither 
thirst any more, neither shall the sun light on them, nor 
any heat ; for the Lamb which is in the midst of the 
throne shall feed them, and shall lead them unto living 
fountains of water." 

Heaven is the gathering place (the glorious home) of 
all who have followed Jesus on earth. What an innu- 
merable host of friends and glorified saints are there! 
The harmony and bliss of heaven is never interrupted. 
No breath of slander shall ever taint that pure atmos- 
phere; no fires of envy ever burn there; no deception, 
or treachery, or unkindness, wound or make bleeding 



96 SUNSET ECHOES 

hearts there! Misapprehension, ingratitude, coolness, 
doubt, and fear, are no more. Love, perfect and ever- 
lasting, shall reign in that bright world forever. To all 
this felicity, death is the gate of entrance. How precious, 
then, in the sight of the Lord, must be the death of his 
saints ! 



MINISTERS NEED THE HOLY SPIRIT. 

The Apostles studied theology three years; Christ, 
the Great Teacher, was their professor, and still they 
were not prepared to proclaim ''the glad tidings of great 
joy*' until they had received a special baptism of the 
Holy Spirit for their work. They were held from their 
work, and commanded, ''Not to depart from Jerusalem,'* 
but wait and pray for the needed and promised Spirit. 
It is quite as necessary now that mxinisters should receive 
the baptism of the Holy Ghost, before they go forth to 
their work. 

This is seen in what is implied and included in the 
Spirit's baptism. 

The Holy Spirit, in an important sense, is our Teach- 
er. The Scriptures plainly declare that a prominent work 
of the Holy Ghost is to teach Christians, and "guide them 
into all truth.'' The Savior says, "The Holy Ghost shall 
teach you all things," "The Spirit of truth shall guide 
you into all truth." It is not necessary to a correct un- 
derstanding of these, and similar passages, that we push 



MINISTERS NEED THE PIOLY SPIRIT 97 

them to the unwise extreme of assumed inspiration, or of 
superceding the need of the Bible. The Bible is the 
word of the Spirit, and is to be illuminated by the Spirit, 
but never superceded by it. 

Humanity is so blind and dull of apprehension in re- 
spect to spiritual things, that stumbling and blundering 
are inevitable without the Spirit's illumination. Then, in 
our depravity, 'The things of the Spirit of God (the 
truths revealed in the written Word) are foolishness 
unto them; they cannot know them because they are 
spiritually discerned.'' However much we may study the 
Bible, unless the Spirit illuminate us, we shall, in a meas- 
ure at least, be ''blind leaders of the blind." 

The deep spiritual truths of the Gospel we can know- 
only by the divinely illuminated word, and this is by 
the Holy Ghost as a spiritual teacher. He reveals no 
new truths, but opens to our understandings those al- 
ready given in the inspired Bible. With our souls filled 
with the Spirit, we shall be full of light, and full of 
truth. A minister called of God to preach the Gospel, 
who is full of the Holy Spirit is full of sermons. Such 
know but little about ''grinding out sermons/' they are 
full of them; the truth in them is like a well of v/ater 
springing up continually. 

We have a clear illustration of the foregoing, in the 
case of the Apostles, before and after Pentecost. How 
little they knew of the Gospel and of its spiritual im- 



98 SUNSET ECHOES 

port before Pentecost, and how much afterward. Before, 
how bHnd, how dull of apprehension, how full of erro- 
neous notions. But afterwards, how their knowledge in- 
creased, and how clear their views of the plan of salva- 
tion. This was the work of the Holy Spirit. This is 
the very effect produced, in all ages, on all men, who are 
baptized with the Holy Spirit. 

The Holy Spirit both clarifies our spiritual vision and 
intensifies the power of apprehended truth. He gives the 
mind more clear and vivid views of truth already ap- 
prehended. All Christians, in a measure at least, have 
the Spirit's light shed on their minds. They have, in a 
general way, at all times a notion of the nature and the 
guilt of sin, and the provisions of the Gospel. But fre- 
quently these truths exert scarcely any influence upon 
them. Let the Holy Spirit shed on these indistinct truths 
His hallowed light, and the mind will be roused to in- 
tense activity. The whole soul will be stimulated by a 
power and energy it never knew before. 

With the power of the Holy Ghost, the soul is 
flooded with light, and the great truths of the Gospel 
become living realities. Jesus Christ and Him cruci- 
fied, hell with its eternal ruin, heaven with its endless 
bliss, become positive, practical matters of fact. Such 
ministers realize the danger of the impenitent, and act 
accordingly. ''They cease not to warn every one night 
and day with tears.'' They labor to save men from hell 
as they would to save them from a burning wreck. 



THE VINE WITH ITS BRANCH^ES 99 



THE VINE WITH ITS BRANCHES. 

Our Savior sets forth in the xv. chapter of John the 
great principles and facts of the Christian Hfe, and its 
duties, by the vine and its branches. 

Will the reader please turn and carefully read the 
first eight verses of that chapter. 

There are several important truths plainly taught in 
this apologue. 

1st. According to this figure all Christians are 
branches in Christ. 'T am the vine, ye are the branches." 
Hence, no man is a Christian who is not in Christ, and 
every man is a Christian who is in Christ. This relation 
is mutual — the branch is united to the vine, and the vine 
is united to the branch. 'T in them, and thou in me.'' 

2d. Christ stands in the same relation to the Chris- 
tian, and the Christian to Christ, as the vine to the 
branches, and the branches to the vine. The Christian's 
life is in Christ, as the life of the branch is in the vine. 
The branch partakes of the nature of the tree, is nour- 
ished by its juice, and lives by its life; so the Christian, 
by abiding in Christ is made to partake of the divine 
nature, and has life in Him. So intimate and vital is the 
relation between Christ and His members that they have 
one and the same life. 

3d. No man remains a Christian any longer than he 



L.ofC. 



lOO SUNSET ECHOES 

abides in Christ. ^'If a man abide not in me, he is cast 
forth as a branch, and is withered." 

If the branch is severed it withers and dies. 

4th. It teaches, that in order to continue in Christ 
— to remain Christian — we must bear fruit — must be use- 
ful. ''Every branch in me, that beareth not fruit, He 
taketh away." If this teaches anything, it is, that we 
can only abide in Him by bearing fruit — ''so shall ye be 
my disciples." 

5th. It clearly teaches the possibility and liability of 
apostacy. The branches taken away must be real 
branches in the vine. If the Christian bear not fruit, 
he will incur a cutting off, which is real apostacy. As a 
vine-dresser will cut off all fruitless and dead branches, 
so Christ will take those away who bear no fruit. It is 
said here in the plainest manner, that a soul may be as 
truly united to Christ as a branch is to the vine, and yet 
on account of unfruitfulness be cut off. No man can 
cut off a branch from a vine to which it never was united. 

6th. Those who abide in Christ and bear fruit. He 
purgeth them — purifies them, that they may bear more 
fruit. That is, in the regenerate believer, who is a 
"branch in" Christ, and who "beareth (some) fruit," 
there remains impurity to be "purged" in order to greater 
fruitfulness. 

Note. "The branch" is "in Christ;" and "If any 
man be in Christ, h^ is a new creature," and he "bear- 



THE VINE WITH ITS BRANCHES lOI 

eth fruit/' He is therefore a true Christian, and a fruit- 
ful Christian, and yet God purgeth him. There is then 
in every such branch — in every such Christian something 
to be purged away ; something of moral evil and defile- 
ment, that limits or hinders fruitfulness and needs ex- 
termination. Its removal is the work of God. ''He 
purgeth itJ' 

7th. This shows that corruption may yet remain in 
those who are in Christ. After God purgeth it. He 
says, ''Nov/ are ye clean through the Word Vv^hich I have 
spoken unto you,'' i. e.. Christians are made clean through 
the purifying power of Christ's ''Word." Hence the 
prayer of Christ — "Sanctify them through Thy truth." 

8th. Christians sanctified by Christ and made clean, 
glorify God in bearing "much fruit." Increased fruit- 
fulness is a result of cleansing, and an evidence of be- 
ing cleansed. God is glorified proportionately to the 
quality, permanency, and abundance of Christian fruit- 
fulness. Purity involves this. "Being made free from 
sin, ye have your fruit unto holiness." 

This is natural, and reasonable; and finds plenty of 
analogies in nature. The sap of the vine alone can 
enable the branch to bear fruit. Right tempers spring 
alone from Christ, and right tempers only can produce 
right actions. Purity affords the graces of the Spirit 
a most luxuriant growth, bearing the fruit of righteous- 
ness to the praise and glory of God. Hence, "If a man 



I02 SUNSET ECHOES 

therefore purge himself from these, he shall be a vessel 
unto honor, sanctified and meet for the Master's use." 



THE BUSS OF THE PURIFIED. 

In the soul cleansed from all sin, all the fruits and 
graces of the Spirit exist complete in quality. Purity of 
heart implies grace without mixture, exclusive of all 
alloy — free from all its antagonisms in the soul. 

Pure love is exclusive. It fills the soul and excludes 
all hatred, ill will, animosity, bitterness, clamor and 
wrath. It excludes all that class of vile and degrading 
passions, which are the chief elements of human corrup- 
tion and woe. 

When cleansed, the heart is free from all pride, lusts, 
envy, jealousy, covetousness, impatience, and all unsanc- 
tified uneasiness and fear. Purification not only extir- 
pates all vile and disturbing evils, but secures an unob- 
structed development of all the moral excellencies im- 
planted in the soul at regeneration. Holiness has both 
a negative and a positive aspect ; the heart is both cleans- 
ed from sin and filled with love. There is both an 
extermination and an impartation. Inbred sin is exter- 
minated, and the Holy Spirit has full possession of the 
soul. Praise the Lord ! 

In the purified soul, faith has reached a measure of 
strength, excluding unbelief, doubts and uncertainty. 

"Meridian light puts doubt to flight." 



THE BLISS OF THE PURIFIED IO3 

Hence, the soul easily, peacefully and confidingly 
abides in Christ. In Him, it has "wisdom, righteousness, 
sanctification and redemption/' It has rest, satisfaction 
and salvation! ''Bless the Lord, O my soul!'' Salva- 
tion now ! Salvation with no uncertainty ! Salvation 
free and full! Salvation sweet and powerful! Salva- 
tion to the extent of the soul's present necessity — from 
both the guilt and the pollution of sin! Scriptural and 
evangelical salvation — both negative and positive — free- 
dom from the condemnation of sin, the commission of 
sin and from the impurity of sin ; with the possession of 
the graces of the Spirit, and the truth, ''as it is in Jesus." 

Some say, "entire sanctification is only a little more 
religion." True, it is more religion ; but thank the Lord 1 
it is more religion in "a clean heart." It is more re- 
ligion with inbred sin or remaining impurity exterminat- 
ed, and in this, the distinction exists, between merely get- 
ting more religion indefinitely and being entirely sancti- 
fied. A man may get more religion many times without 
having his soul fully cleansed from all sin. 

"Blessed are the pure in heart." How rich, and how 
blessed this unmixed and powerfully intensified religious 
life. With such, the precious work of regeneration and 
all its concomitants are more manifest in the conscious- 
ness of the soul. They are more clearly apprehended, 
and more powerfully felt as solid, precious heart-felt 
realities. Holiness secures clearness of spiritual vision; 



104 SUNSET ECHOES 

or at least, a clearer apprehension of spiritual things, than 
can be otherwise obtained. ^'They shall see God/' 

*'If we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we 
have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus 
Christ, His Son, cleanseth us from all sin." This "walk- 
ing in the light'' (in the light of truth and spiritual 
things), "as God is in the light." How delightful! How 
luminous and inspiring ! How blessed ! 

Grace in a pure heart has advantages which it can- 
not have in the soul not wholly cleansed. When fully 
saved, there is a clearness, a freeness, a sweetness and 
fullness not possible in the mixed moral condition of the 
merely regenerate. Glory! and praise to our blessed 
Savior, He can and does save most gloriously when the 
soul is fully committed to Him, and His will is fully 
done. 

It is no fault of Christ's that there are not to-day in 
the ministry of the Methodist Episcopal Church, fifteen 
thousand "mighty men of God," entirely sanctified and 
filled "with peace in believing, and joy in the Holy 
Ghost," engaged in the good work of "spreading scrip- 
tural holiness over these lands." 

It is no fault in the rich and ample provisions of 
grace, that we have not now, in our own loved com- 
munion, fifty thousand class leaders filled with every 
spiritual benediction, Carvosso like, prepared to lead 



THE BLISS or THE PURIFIED I05 

their little flocks into the ''green pastures and beside the 
still waters.'' 

It is no fault of the great atonement, or of our in- 
terceding Christ, nor of the blessed Bible, nor of the 
infinite and eternal Spirit, that we have not three mil- 
lions of ''wholly sanctified'' Methodists on this continent 
moving with the tread of a moral earthquake, in evan- 
gelizing this world to God. 

O, that I could utter all my soul on this subject in 
the ears of a thousand ministers, ten thousand class lead- 
ers, and ten times ten thousand Church members, all of 
whose prayers, sacrifices and tears should have refer- 
ence to this world's salvation. 

O, how desirable to have "perfect love," which "casts 
out fear," that makes us "free indeed," and secures 
within us a well of living water "springing up into ever- 
lasting life." To have all the mind that was in Christ, 
to be clothed in raiment bleached white in the Redeemer's 
blood, and to know something of the nature of that 
purity, which constitutes a chief element of paradise. O 
yes, yes, my inmost soul responds, yes! 

There is such light, such love, such plainness, such 
certainty, such simplicity, such life, such power, such 
sweetness, such security, such divinity and glory wrap- 
ped up in the experience of a pure heart, as to make it 
joyful and desirable beyond all power of description. 

I know this, dear reader. I would not dare to write 



I06 SUNSET ECHOES 

it if I did not know it. O, this spiritual Kingdom ! May 
the Lord help us to enter it more fully, so as to see and 
enjoy more of its charming glories. *Traise God from 
whom all blessings flow." Here we can find in abund- 
ant fullness, righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy 
Ghost." 

Believe me, dear reader, our Methodist Canaan of 
perfect love is an exceeding goodly land. 



THE JOY or SALVATION. 

The psalmist prayed — "Restore unto me the joy of 
Thy salvation,'" Ps. li. 

Let me present a few elements of the joy of every 
truly saved soul. 

1st. There is a joy of pardon. 

All believers are forgiven, their sins are blotted "out, 
they are justified freely and fully "through the redemp- 
tion in Christ Jesus." The truly saved have a revela- 
tion made to them that God has forgiven all their sins, 
so that they possess the joy of pardon. 

2d. There is a sense of Divine reconciliation. 

The convicted sinner is made to realize that God is 
pleased with him, and he finds himself pleased with 
God. The moral estrangement between his soul and 
God has ceased. His opposition to God and shyness of 
Him has ended, and there is fellowship and friendship 
with Christ. 



THE JOY OF SALVATION IO7 

3d. There is the joy of spiritual life. 

The Christian is quickened into a new spiritual Hfe, 
full of sweetness, vitaHty and joy. It is the highest and 
most blissful form of life — the life of Christ in the soul, 
and the beginning of eternal life with all its beatitudes. 

4th. There is the spirit of love. 

'The love of God is shed abroad in the heart by the 
Holy Ghost.'' "Every one that loveth is born of God 
and knoweth God." This spirit is the fulfillment of the 
law, the root and foundation of all acceptable obedience. 
It is a sweet controlling force in the soul, existing both 
as a principle and as an emotion, involving choice and 
delight in God. 

5 th. There is a sense of inward purity. 

This is partial or complete, as the soul is only regen- 
erated, or entirely sanctified. Those but partially puri- 
fied have some discordant element of indwelling sin to 
mar their peace, while those fully saved can say, with 
David Brainard, 'T am clean from both past and pres- 
ent sin." When the blood of Christ has been applied to 
the heart, and the pure love of God fills the heart, there 
is a sweet sense of present inward purity. 

*'0 the bliss of the purified/' 

6th. There is a sense of inward harmony — soul-rest. 

The saved soul is in harmony with God, with all 
holy things, and with itself. Its powers are so purified, 
adjusted, and brought into such correlations with each 



I08 SUNSET ECHOES 

Other, and with God, that their action becomes harmo- 
nious. There is freedom from all discord in the soul. 
Grace attunes the soul to the sweet harmony of love by 
putting every pipe, string and active force in unison with 
Christ. O the bliss of being in spiritual tone, so that 
the Word and the Holy Ghost may produce the very 
harmony of heaven in our souls. When every power, 
every affection, and every element of the soul's activi- 
ties is in such tune that not a note, not even a semi-note 
is out of harmony. what music! No words can de- 
scribe it. ''Joy unspeakable and full of glory,'' 

7th. There is a deep and solid sense of peace. 

Peace is an all-pervading element in the redeemed 
soul. "The Lord will give His people peace.'' God de- 
sires His children to enjoy what He enjoys, hence He 
says, ''My peace I give unto you." When our blessed 
Savior stood and cried, 'Tf any man thirst, let him come 
unto me and drink," He called upon all to come and 
drink at the fountain of His own infinite felicity. ''These 
things have I spoken unto you (said He) that my joy 
might remain in you, and that your joy might be full." 

7th. There is a sense of blessed vision. 

Saints have been brought "out of darkness into 
light," and are "children of light." Their path is "as 
the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the 
perfect day." Light is the medium of sight. Grace re- 
veals God. "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they 



THE JOY OF SALVATION IO9 

shall see God." Pardon and purity place the soul where 
It apprehends God, v/here it sees the ''King in His 
beauty," and where the charming glories of the God- 
man are poured upon the soul. The increasing vision 
of God and truth is a source of rapturous delight to 
every faithful child of God. 

8th. There is a joyous sense of blessed hope, 
Hope is the pleasing anticipation of future good. 
Every saint of God is begotten unto a lively hope, by the 
resurrection of Christ from the dead, to an inheritance 
incorruptible, undefiled, and that fadeth not away, and 
reserved in heaven for him. This hope is like an an- 
chor to the soul, sure and steadfast. It is based upon 
the promise and oath of God, is sealed and witnessed to 
by the blood and death of Christ, and is as grand and 
glorious as heaven. 
Remarks : 

1. It is a fearfully ominous fact, that multitudes of 
professing Christians appear to be entirely destitute of 
religious joy — ''the joy of the Lord." 

2. A great many professors of religion seem not 
to care for this blessing, apparently forgetting that this 
joy is inseparable from a truly religious life, 

3. It must appear that the absence of these elements 
of religious joy negative a positively religious life. 

Pardon, reconciliation, life, love, purity, soul har- 



no SUNSET ECHOES 

mony, peace, light and hope constitute the very essence 
of godUness. 

4. Thousands of people who claim to be Christians 
are scrambling after dress, money and pleasure, run- 
ning to concerts, shows, theaters, and parties of pleas- 
ure, while the closet, the prayer service and God are neg- 
lected. 

5. Respecting all these pleasure-loving, wretched, 
muttering, grumbling professors, we feel like adopting 
the language of the Church of England, ''Good Lord de- 
liver us/' 

6. The absence of spiritual joy dishonors God, and 
is a reproach to the religion of Jesus Christ. It is a 
great stumbling-block to sinners, and leads them to think 
religion is a mere pretence — a sham. 

Again, I pray from legalists and that legal state of 
mind, which underestimates, disparages and misrepre- 
sents religion, ''Good Lord deliver usJ' 



REGENERATION WITH ITS CONCOMITANTS. 

It is frequently said, the advocates of entire sanctifi- 
cation minify the grace and work of regeneration to make 
a place for entire sanctification. This is a mistake and a 
misrepresentation. The fact is, no class, of Christian 
teachers emphasize more, or teach more clearly and fully 
all the essential items of initial salvation, including par- 
don or justification; regeneration or the new birth, the 



REGENERATION WITH ITS CONCOMITANTS III 

reception of spiritual life and heirship to eternal life, than 
those who teach the duty and privilege of being entirely 
cleansed from sin, and fully sanctified to God. They 
hold regeneration, with its accompaniments of pardon, 
adoption, dethronement of sin, and initial purification, as 
the greatest thing God ever does for a soul in this world, 
or any other. We believe with Richard Watson — ''Re- 
generation, which accompanies justification, is a large 
approach to this state of perfect holiness." 

Justification, regeneration and adoption, all things 
considered, are much greater than the purification of the 
child of God from remaining indwelling sin, which com- 
pletes the work of entire sanctification. 

Dr. Adam Clarke says, ''justification is far greater 
than sanctification.'' After describing entire sanctifica- 
tion, he adds, "Great as this work is, how little, humanly 
speaking is it, when compared with what God has already 
done for thee." (See Clarke's Theology, p. 206.) 

Justification and regeneration, including our change 
to the divine government and law, and the change 
wrought in us, are much greater than that of "perfect 
holiness," or our entire sanctification. In a judicial point 
of view, no change can exceed that which occurs when 
God pardons our sins, and the "washing of regeneration," 
which carries the soul back to the condition of childhood, 
involves the larger part of our purification. While this 
grace does not remove or destroy original or birth sin 



112 SUNSET ECHOES 

(so called), it does remove all our acquired depravity 
with its pollution. The declaration of Christ, ^'Except 
ye be converted and become as little children, etc.," 
throws a flood of light on this subject. 

The phenomenal, or conscious experience of some 
who are entirely sanctified may sometimes appear 
greater than their regeneration, nevertheless with many, 
even this is not the case. Some with the flaming, glow- 
ing experience of purity, in the all cleansing blood of 
Christ, may have made the impression that the new birth 
and their initial salvation, was a small thing compared 
with the fuller cleansing in entire sanctification, but 
that was only in their emotional condition and gospel 
freedom. 

Entire sanctification, as a moral condition, is only 
greater than regeneration, in that there is added to all 
that initial salvation includes, a complete cleansing of 
the soul, so that those great, grand initial facts which are 
coetaneous with the Christian life, stand out in the soul's 
apprehension of consciousness more clearly and intensely 
than ever. Hence it is that some are never fully satisfied 
with the evidence of their sonship and Christian char- 
acter until their heart is fully cleansed. Full salvation 
sheds a flood of light on the regenerate and justified 
state. 

O ! for the light of purity to settle the minds of mil- 
lions as to their justification. 



SOME SANCTIFIED IN ALL DENOMINATIONS II3 



SOME ENTIRELY SANCTIFIED IN ALL 
DENOMINATIONS. 

There have been holy men and women, entirely sanc- 
tified, in all ages, in all nations and in all Christian 
churches. While it is a lamentable fact, that a large 
proportion of Christian professors in the various churches 
deny the doctrine through misapprehension, prejudice or 
other causes, it must be conceded that many in all our 
sister denominations really trust the cleansing blood, and 
are pure-hearted Christians. They may not call their 
gracious state ''perfect love,'' or ''holiness,'' or "entire 
sanctification." 

Many of these, if they were "taught the way of God 
more perfectly," would declare with John, "Herein is our 
love made perfect" and we would hear them exhort their 
brethren, saying, "It is the will of God even your sanc- 
tification," and "Therefore — let us go on unto perfec- 
tion." 

These pure-hearted believers, usually express their at- 
tainments by the terms "faith of assurance," "full assur- 
ance," "the higher life," and similar phrases which they 
think less offensive in their churches than "Christian 
perfection," "perfect love," and "sanctification," which 
as we view it, are more Scriptural, and are expressively 
significant of the work wrought. We are sorry to know 



114 SUNSET ECHOES 

that some of our ministers and members in like manner 
are adopting terms of their own in the place of the 
divinely inspired terms of the Bible. 

In all periods of the Church, while there has been 
much darkness regarding the theory of gospel holiness, 
there have been beautiful examples of its possession. 
Many of the martyrs triumphed in this grace, in dun- 
geons and at the stake who may have been very erron- 
eous in their religious theory respecting this doctrine, 
as well as regarding many other doctrines. 

Light has increased in the Church, and we are now 
ashamed of many superstitious absurdities once held in 
the earlier and darker days of our dispensation, and espe- 
cially of early Roman and Protestant Christianity. What 
absurd and foolish notions were held by some very pious 
and great men regarding the doctrine of predestination, 
election and reprobation only a few years ago! There 
are very few now in any church who will teach all the 
sentiments of Calvin. The Antinomianism of the times 
of Wesley is fading away now as compared with bygone 
years. 

So, with the doctrine of entire sanctification as set 
forth in the blessed Bible, it has been misunderstood and 
misrepresented and by many rejected; but with increas- 
ing light in the Church the crudities which have been 
thrown around it will disappear, and it will be more and 
more understood, and the churches will become more 



HOLINESS IS RELIGION MADE EASY II5 

and more harmonious regarding its essential items and 
experience. In a few years there will come to be as 
much harmony regarding Christian sanctification as there 
is now regarding the doctrine of justification by faith. 



HOLINESS IS RELIGION MADE EASY. 

With Christian purity established in the soul, how easy 
and natural it is to love and obey God ! Surely the devil 
has not all the advantage in this world. With the soul 
fully saved and full of peace, light and love, a religious 
life becomes second nature and a luxury; more of a di- 
vine charm than a tedious service. 

The best religious life is the easiest life, and the hard- 
est and most difficult one is a half-hearted one. A soul 
full of love delights in the law of God, and to such the 
divine commandments are never grievous but joyous. 
The law of sin and death, no more wars in his members, 
this being taken av^^ay he runs the way of God's com- 
mandments and finds them health and life to his soul. 

The fully sanctified soul, like his blessed Master, is 
swallowed up in divine love and zeal, and it is his ''meat 
and drink to do the v/ill of his heavenly Father:" To 
such a Christian God is his all in all. And whether he 
eat or drink, sleep or rest, labor, read, hear, speak or 
pray, whatever he does, he does all in the name of the 
Lord Jesus and to the glory of God. His eye is single 
and his whole body is full of light. His motives, disposi- 



Il6 SUNSET ECHOES 

tion and desires are pure and right, and his life is hid 
with Christ in God. He Hves by faith on the Son of God. 
His spiritual vision is clear and his communion with God 
unintermittent. He thinks, talks and acts with the full 
enjoyment of gospel holiness. He does not sin against 
God in thought, word and deed, as some profess to do, 
but honors God in thoughts, words and deeds. 

Entire sanctification is a moral condition in which 
faith continually sees him that is invisible; a humility 
that pervades the soul as a subdued temper; a love that 
rules the heart as a sweet, heavenly disposition ; a patience 
that calmly endures whatever God sends or allows ; a sub- 
mission that says in all things, ''Not as I will, but as thou 
wilt'^; a meekness that is undisturbed by fits of anger; 
a contentment that is happy in the allotments of provi- 
dence; a gratitude that responds to divine beneficence; 
a courage that is invincible in the line of duty; a self- 
denial that takes pleasure in the will of God; a charity 
that puts the most favorable construction on everybody 
that the facts will justify; a peace like a river in depth 
and plentitude; a joy like a perpetual spring, and often 
"unspeakable and full of glory" ; a hope like an anchor 
of the soul, sure and steadfast ; a brotherly kindness that 
does to others as Vv^e would have done to us, and a purity 
that keeps all the passions and apppetites in harmony 
with the will and law of God. All this becomes natural 
and easy. 



WHY GOD DELAYS ANSWER TO PRAYER Ii; 



WHY GOD DELAYS A^SWER TO PRAYER. 

The prophet Habakkuk two thousand five hundred 
years ago, under the pressure of spiritual need, cried to 
God: "O Lord, how long shall I cry, and thou wilt not 
hear! even cry out unto thee of violence, and thou wilt 
not save !" The question suggested by these words is, 
Why does not God more readily answer prayer? Very 
likely there are many reasons why prayer does not more 
generally receive immediate answer. 

It may be because so many fail to see the plague, or 
spiritual ailments of their own hearts. Acceptable prayer 
must come from a heart sensible of its individual iniqui- 
ties, and that lies in the dust, with humility before God. 
When the heart, conscious of its defilement, and humbled 
on its account, supplicates with ''strong crying and tears,'' 
God will hear, and lift him up, and enable him to come 
boldly to the throne of grace, and obtain mercy and find 
grace to help in every time of need. The hindrance to 
successful prayer is never with God, but always with or 
in ourselves. ''Ye ask and receive not, because ye ask 
amiss." 

Delays in answer to prayer may be occasioned by 
littleness of prayer. He who prays but little or seldom, 
disobeys God — and he will not hear him when he docs 
pray. We are commanded to pray without ceasing, and 



Il8 SUNSET ECHOES 

to pray with all prayer and supplication. He who prays 
but little not only displeases God, and grieves his Spirit, 
but loses the spirit of prayer — and he fails to pray effect- 
ually or fervently. It is the effectual and fervent prayer 
of the righteous that availeth much. 

The delay in receiving answers in many instances 
may result from a lack of dependence upon Christ. God 
can hear and answer our prayers only through Christ; 
and when we fail to feel our dependence upon his merits 
and intercession, we pray in vain. God answers prayer 
for Christ's sake, and Christ is the only way of access 
to the throne of grace. The name of Christ may be 
used in our approaches to God from mere habit; 
when this is the case, our prayers will receive no answer. 
Delays in answer to prayer may result from a disobedient 
life. Disobedience blocks the work of God, and 
puts an embargo on the whole religious life. If 
we would have God hear and answer our prayers 
more readily, we must obey him more fully. He pays no 
man a premium for disobedience. Disobedience cuts the 
sinews of faith, and renders evangelical faith impossible ; 
as conscious confidence (faith) and conscious rebelHon 
cannot co-exist. One excludes the other. It should never 
be forgotten that the faith that justifies, sanctifies, and 
saves men, is inseparable from an obedient spirit. God 
hath joined them together, and no man can put them 
asunder. Acceptable prayer without faith is impossible, 



THE BLESSEDNESS OF PURITY II9 

and faith without an obedient spirit is impossible. When 
our prayers are examined in the Hght of the inspired 
word of God, it is not difificult to see why so few are 
answered, and why our loving heavenly Father delays 
to bestow much that is sought at his hand. When Chris- 
tians see the plague of their own hearts — when they are 
willing to fully obey God — when they pray without ceas- 
ing and stop trusting in means and measures and when 
they properly feel their dependence upon Christ, then 
God will hear and answer and pour them out a blessing 
that there shall not be room enough to receive it. 



THE BLESSEDNESS OF PURITY. 

It is a remarkable fact that mankind, so universally 
in quest of happiness, searches for it in every place but 
the right one. They ransack creation to find it ; while it 
lies beyond the bounds of creation. 

The benevolent Creator, however, has made happiness 
possible to every creature — has brought it to our doors, 
has poured it upon us through a thousand channels, and 
we resist it through our perverse wills and misplaced af- 
fections, and remain ill at ease when we might be rejoic- 
ing in God our Savior. 

That life is fraught with ills, no observer of society 
can doubt. 'In the world ye shall have tribulation.'' But 
how shall these ills — these destroyers of our happiness — 
be removed, and their power broken ? To meet this de- 



I20 SUNSET ECHOES 

sideratum, we mig'ht propose several rules in detail, which 
would all be very good ; but it will be a shorter method to 
point the soul to that holiness, without which we cannot 
see God, which affords an adequate, many-sided remedy 
for them all ; that touches the core of the difficulty, and 
sends health and comfort through the whole soul. It 
gives content in the palace and the dungeon ; in the sun- 
light of prosperity, and in the dark day of sorrow and ad- 
versity. 

Holiness brings man to the true source of happiness, 
which is God. Most men are miserable because they ex- 
pect happiness from the wrong source. They look where 
it cannot be found, and hence must be disappointed. The 
sage has taught us that "Man wants but little, nor wants 
that little long ;'V but the great study and mistake of man 
has been to add to his list of wants ad infinitum. The 
higher gift eclipses the lower, so that in a sense the holy 
man realizes but one indispensable want. Others may be 
well, but he can do without them ; only God is necessary. 

Holiness promotes human happiness by affording a 
true estimate and interpretation of the ills of life. These 
ills, to many, so embitter the cup as to render life uncom- 
fortable, and cause the sweets that are mingled with it 
to be unappreciated. To the good man, though severe and 
often crucifying, yet they appear but for a moment. And 
during the moment of their continuance, instead of a 
curse, they afford lessons of wisdom, and work out a far 



THE BLESSEDNESS OF PURITY 121 

more exceeding and eternal weight of glory. The pure 
heart is meek and resigned, and extracts sweetness out 
of the most bitter tribulation. It even marshals" the dark 
messengers of earthly sorrow into the line of helpers in 
the way to heaven. 

Holiness imparts stability to. character, and enables 
the soul to stem the tide of tribulation without vexing the 
soul, or fretting away its meekness, faith or patience. 
Most that fall at all, fall by littles. They lose a little pa- 
tience here, and a little meekness there, and a little faith 
yonder, until they find one day that their religion has 
mysteriously departed. Holiness gives a man ballast, and 
staidness of life, and carries him safely through the petty 
vexations which lie along his path. 

Holiness preoccupies the mind with controlling and 
elevating thoughts of God and heaven. We are made to 
think, but not on trifles. The soul without grace is in- 
clined to turn in upon itself, upon the little cares and 
vexations of life, and so consume its own energies by 
chafing and fretting, as to bring along gray hairs before 
their time. We are bidden to look up. The martyr, we 
are told, while gazing on the ineffable glories of Christ, 
forgot the fires kindling about his poor body. 

There are moments of leisure, or weakness, or sick- 
ness, when the trials and ills of life rush in like a flood, 
and the worldly man has no standard to lift against them. 
Who has not felt the need of Divine and superhuman 



122 SUNSET ECHOES 

help in the hour of greatest weakness and trial; when 
these ills pelt us unmercifully like a legion of devils, de- 
termined on our ruin? All who would live safely and 
happily in this world should seek, first and last, to be holy. 
''Blessed are the pure in heart/' 



HOW TO PREACH WELL. 

A distinguished divine, of great heavenly-mindedness, 
left on record this resolution: ''Always to eat my ser- 
mons before I preach them/' This resolution we both ap- 
prove and love. It commends itself to our reason and to 
our heart. It breathes the spirit of profound sincerity, 
and evinces a heart that dealt with truth honestly. 

When a man delineates spiritual religion, not so much 
as the result of study and reasoning, as a matter of his 
own experience; when he unfolds it with that spirit of 
Ufe and earnestness which accompany truth drawn from 
one's own bosom, he cannot be powerless. There is noth- 
ing vague and uncertain, nothing unintelligible, in the 
speech of such a man. 

His heart's desire is that his hearers may be saved. 
He presses earnestly towards his object. His inward emo- 
tion he cannot conceal. It bursts from the lips ; it speaks 
from the eye ; it modulates the tone ; it pervades the whole 
manner; it possesses and controls the whole man; he is 
seen to be in earnest ; he disarms criticism ; he convinces, 
he persuades, he speaks with power. 



HOW TO PREACH WELL 1 23 

A pure life, harmonizing with the truth we preach, 
puts all the human faculties under the pres- 
sure and power of sanctified motives. When 
the heart is pressed and well-nigh crushed 
with a sense of its duty and responsibility, then it will 
speak with power ; then the heart and conscience will ex- 
ert their combined power, and every talent will be em- 
ployed, and the whole man is urged into full and efficient 
action. 

How often have we felt the conviction forced upon 
us that this or that brother did not eat his sermon before 
he preached it, or, if he did, he failed to digest it, or re- 
duce it to practice afterwards. 

We have sometimes wished that in some favored mo- 
ment, when the heart is most tender, and most open to 
kind, admonitory suggestions, we could get a secret audi- 
ence with such a brother. We would feel constrained, 
perhaps, to say to him : *'My brother, are you not con- 
scious that the tone of piety which the spirit of your ser- 
mon breathes is very much higher than that which you 
exhibit on all other occasions, except when preaching? 
Do you not in your public instructions hold up a standard 
of life which you neither attain, nor seem honestly to seek 
to attain yourself? Do you not urge a measure of self- 
denial which you do not practice ; and a fervency in prayer 
to which your own closet never bears witness, and a zeal 



124 SUNSET ECHOES 

for the salvation of souls which is not apparent in your- 
self when out of the pulpit?" 

We know these are tender points ; but are they not of 
the most vital importance ? Can we expect that the truth 
from our lips will be like a two-edged sword, unless it be 
sustained by a godly life, enforcing the conviction on 
saint and sinner, that we are radically honest, and pro- 
foundly sincere in all we say and teach ? 

If it be not so with us, our hearers will say, *'Oh, he 
does not mean much ! You know he does not himself liv^ 
as he says we all should ; it is his profession to preach, 
and he must be smart, or the church would not like him." 

Now, when the most eloquent and logical preaching 
under heaven is counteracted by this undercurrent from 
the preacher's known spirit and life, what power can there 
be in his utterances, or what good can he do? Nay, what 
evil will he not do? 

Alas! the fearful efifects of making religion and its 
teachings a professional thing, and abstracting from this 
profession the heart's deep honesty and realization of the 
truth taug'ht. It will never do to make sermon-making a 
science, and preaching a profession, with the vitality of 
godliness wanting. Such a course will make more infidels 
than Christians. 

''Thou therefore who teacheth another — teachest thou 
not thyself?" If we fail to do this, our hearts will wax 
hard, and the Spirit of God will forsake us. All minis- 



THE SELF-PERPETUATING POWER OF SIN I25 

terial efficiency is of God. With his smiles and presence, 
with his all-powerful aid, they can do anything; without 
it, just nothing, or really what is worse than nothing. 
Without God with us, we may preach so as to harden 
men's hearts, but not so as to subdue and save them — 
this requires the might of God's Spirit. 

No man has a right to expect that God will be in his 
words if God is not in his heart and life. If there is that 
in our heart and life which displeases the Holy Ghost, 
how can we expect him to sanction our preaching, and 
put the seal of heaven upon our mission? God never 
winks at sin. 

All unbelief makes God a liar. All worldliness is an 
abomination in his sight, and anything that shuts out the 
spirit of God from a preacher's heart renders his preach- 
ing powerless. 



THE SELF^PERPETUATING POWER OF SIN. 

Every one must see that it is an awful fact, if true, 
that sin has in its own nature a self-perpetuating power. 
That this is true, we have too many and too painful evi- 
dences. 

So far as we know, there ^e but two races of beings 
who have ever made trial of the energies of sin upon 
the minds of moral agents — fallen angels and fallen men. 
The angels that kept not their first estate, began with 
one sin. Having committed that, it became a momentous 



126 SUNSET ECHOES 

question — all heaven hung in suspense to know the re- 
sult; will they go on and commit another, and another? 
The question was soon decided, and decided so as to 
banish all doubt of their future course. They went on 
sinning. The first step led the way to the second. Each 
successive sin made a perpetual course of sinning the 
more certain. Each sin made a fresh impression on 
their moral powers, and that impression served only 
to obliterate more perfectly every tendency toward holi- 
ness, and confirm every tendency toward sin. Hence, 
they went on with a continually increasing momentum. 

So with sinning man. If we could see his case de- 
veloped without any restraint from God's providence or 
from his Spirit, we have every reason to suppose that it 
would not differ in the least from the case of fallen 
angels. None would return to virtue or the path of 
life. Every new step forward would make the return 
more hopeless, and the onward and downward move- 
ment more rapid and more desperate. Such are all the 
tendencies of sin, and we see it clearly developed in 
these awful cases which bear the marks of a soul aban- 
doned of God. 

Fix your eye on the drunkard who has gone beyond 
the restraints of his honor, his wife,, his children, his 
health, his soul. See his motions. Mark his reckless- 
ness. If no strong arm interposes, will he return to 



THE SELF-PERPETUATING POWER OF SIN I27 

sobriety? Never! You feel safe in predicting his swift 
and hopeless ruin. 

Let your eye run along the track of that young man 
who went into the city for a place behind the counter. 
Once honest, moral, diligent, in a dark moment the temp- 
ter came. He gambled, he defrauded, or he set his 
foot within the door of ''her whose house is the way 
to hell, going down to the chambers of death." The 
first step demanded the second. He must cover up, for 
how can he bear the disgrace of such a sin. Hence the 
thousand arts of concealment, and no longer any shrink- 
ing from falsehood. This serves to crush the self-restor- 
ing vitality of his moral system. And there is that for- 
bidden sweet ; he has sipped the cup of pleasure ; it mad- 
dens his soul and he dashes on. Ah, he is as good as 
dead already ! Satan has his fetters riveted on, and leads 
him captive at his own will. 

Oh, it is a fearful thing to sin ! It so paralyzes the 
power of virtuous principles, quickens the susceptibility 
to temptation, hedges up the way of the sinner's return 
— commits him to one invariable course, onward and 
downward, maddening the soul for still darker deeds, 
and more damning guilt. This is the great secret of the 
fearful deeds of wickedness so prevalent in these days. 

Verily, sin is no trifle. Who would dare begin if 
he saw where it would end! Who would put his bark 
even in the outer and gentle sweep of the maelstrom for 



128 SUNSET ECHOES 

the pleasure of floating without oar or sail, if he clearly 
saw the certain acceleration of his velocity, the hopeless- 
ness of return, and the rocks at the fatal center, where 
hope and life are dashed forever? 

Reader, there is for sinners on this earth only one 
remedy — the almighty arm of Jesus. Cry to him and he 
will save; he has saved myriads; and do this as soon 
as you can. Every moment's delay gives you a more 
fearful momentum in sin; draws you nearer the vortex 
of ruin, and places you still farther away from the out- 
stretched arm that alone can save you. He that believes 
and does accordingly, shall be wise for himself; but 
whoso scorns, or passes by in neglect, he alone must 
bear it. 



''THE SWORD OF THE LORD AND OF GIDEON.'' 

Has not ''the set time come to favor Zion?'' The re- 
vival fire is now burning in more than a thousand 
churches in our land. God is marvellously at work. The 
flame is spreading. Multitudes are being converted to 
Christ. Many of our sanctuaries are being made vocal 
with the songs and praise of new born souls. Everlasting 
praise, be unto the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost. 

Shall the work cease? And as a church are we all 
ready for this ''coming of the Lord?'' As soldiers of 
Christ, are we in the field, and each at his post? 

If any of the professed friends of Jesus are not ready 



''the sword of the lord and of Gideon'' 129 

for this blessed visitation, let us humble ourselves be- 
fore God. Let us search our hearts, and by prayer, 
fasting, supplications and faith, press into the inner- 
temple — the holy of holies. 

Let us go to God in our closets, and there on our 
knees repent, confess, consecrate and believe until our 
hearts are melted, subdued, and wholly sanctified to God. 
Let us plead in the dust until we get the victory, the 
mighty working spirit. Then for a general shout, "the 
Sword of the Lord and of Gideon.^' 

This is a special time to work for God. O! that 
every dear follower of Christ may know ''the day of 
their visitation.'' Let the Gospel invitation become com- 
mon on the lips of all Christians — "come thou with us 
and we will do thee good, for the Lord hath spoken good 
concerning Israel.'' Husbands, look after your uncon- 
verted wives. Wives, be true and faithful to your un- 
saved husbands. Christian parents, do all your duty to 
your unconverted children, and put forth a wise and time- 
ly effort to save them now. Dress them, educate them, 
and train them for God and immortality. Let every 
Christian go out after his unconverted neighbor, and 
be perseveringly faithful to them. 

Let the great cry be. Lord, send a general baptism 
throughout the whole church, that there may be a 
united engagement east and west, north and south, 
mighty for God. 



130 SUNSET ECHOES 

Let us give for God, and work for God, and never 
mind the noise or excitement of the battle, but stand 
with united sympathies, prayers and co-operation against 
the infernal allies, *'the world, the flesh, and the devil/' 
Some wise ones, and some popular, fashionable, modern- 
ized professors will cry out against excitement and ex- 
travagance; but let God's people fear nothing but sin, 
and rest assured the Lord will take care of his own 
work and work in his own way. If we would have the 
altar fires of Heaven kindled everywhere, and this re- 
vival flame spread all through our land, we must labor 
for it. We must pray for it. We must believe for, and 
expect it, and may God grant it. Amen! 

O that I could utter all my soul on this subject, to 
fifty thousand Methodist class-leaders, in our own loved 
church. Come, friends of our mighty Savior, in his 
name and strength let us do all our duty now. Time 
flies. Let us begin at once. Seize the present and do 
to-day the work of to-day. God help you to begin now ! 
This moment. 

Don't let the membership fail to pray for the min- 
istry, that they may be filled with the Holy Ghost, and 
wield ''the sword of the spirit, which is the word of 
God.'' Oh ! that this Jerusalem blade divinely furbished 
and furnished, may be made bare in achieving great and 
glorious victories, filling heaven with joy and hell with 
consternation. With over fifteen thousand traveling 



THE ATONEMENT I3I 

Methodist ministers in our division of the grand army, 
the battle ought to wax hot, and multitudes of the un- 
godly ought to be ''pricked in the heart," and lead to 
cry for mercy. O that ''the slain of the Lord may be 
many." Fellow soldiers, and brethren beloved, in the 
strength of the God of battles let us buckle on the armor 
and rally to the field of conflict, and let us make one 
long and mighty onslaught upon selfishness, pride, cove- 
tousness, infidelity and every other power of hell. 

Brethren, if there is a heaven and a hell, a God and 
Savior, a divine law, unalterable and eternal, let us see 
to it that we are doing our whole duty now. 



THE ATONEMENT. 



There are three things bearing directly on this great 
truth, which I know with the most satisfactory assur- 
ance. The first is that I am a sinner and need pardon. 
The second is that my nature is polluted and needs 
cleansing. The third is the precious fact, that through 
faith in Christ, I have, and do obtain pardon and purity. 

The first and second I know by direct conscious- 
ness — or conscious experience. Of the third, I have no 
less satisfactory and certain assurance, being promised 
in the revealed truth of God, witnessed to by the Holy 
Spirit, and realized by conscious experience. 

Very likely I know little about the nature of the 
atonement, or the manner in which the death of Christ 



132 SUNSET ECHOES 

lays an adequate foundation for justification and sancti- 
fication. 

As a foundation of faith, however, I ask no other 
consideration, in connection with a consciousness of my 
necessities, than the plainly revealed fact that God can 
be just, and justify the believer in Jesus, and, ''that the 
blood of Jesus Christ, his Son, cleanseth from all sin." 

Those who came to Christ for healing, did not need, 
as a condition of believing in Him, to understand the 
manner in which he would effect their cure. That, they 
probably never knew. They only needed to know that 
he was able and willing to do this thing for them. This 
they believed, and the work was wrought. 

I have found this scriptural and old Wesleyan doc- 
trine both safe and successful; and have no inclination 
to run after modern speculation on this subject. If ad- 
hered to, we will be saved from much unnecessary hair- 
splitting and division among themselves. 



HOLINESS TO THE LORD I33 



''HOLINESS TO THE LORD.'' 

The history of the Church of God may be searched 
in vain, to find a parallel in attention to the great sub^ 
ject of personal holiness, stich as has stirred the heart 
of Zion during the past forty years. ''Holiness to the 
Lord," has become as never before, the great ''central 
idea," in the tented grove, in the prayer service, in sacred 
song and religious testimony 

Tens of thousands hungering and thirsting after 
righteousness, have been refreshed and quickened, while 
great numbers have believed and entered into rest from 
inbred sin. This has been more or less the case in all 
sections of Protestant Christendom. 

The obvious fact is, our people everywhere are feel- 
ing the need of a deeper, higher and more intensified 
spiritual life, and sympathize with every wholesome effort 
to secure it. The great felt want of the Christian 
church in our day is purity, and evangelical power, 
which in the divine economy are joined and inseparable. 

During a few years past there has been a peaceful 
and happy disposition, generally prevalent in both min- 
istry and laity, to dispense with needless speculation and 
controversy and seek by consecration, prayer and faith 
the cleansing blood of Jesus. How blessed is this ! How 
glorious the victories achieved! How precious the bap- 



134 SUNSET ECHOES 

tisms of love received ! And how many in all our churches 
are now walking in the clear light and on the high 
grounds of established holiness! How precious and de- 
lightful the Christian life! And how little of discord! 
Let God be praised and let his people rejoice ! 

A revival of personal holiness will secure and pro- 
mote everything desirable in the love and unity, effi- 
ciency and aggressive power of the Church. Holiness 
becometh Zion — is her beauty and glory. It has in 
itself intrinsic excellence and power. Purity — sweet, 
moral Gospel purity — a whole constellation of vir- 
tues — perfect love, excluding hatred — perfect faith, ex- 
cluding unbelief — perfect humility, excluding pride — 
perfect meekness, excluding anger, and perfect patience, 
excluding impatience. 

Let God be praised ! Here are riches and honors like 
the source whence they emanate — glorious as heaven and 
lasting as eternity. This holiness God enjoins and ex- 
pects, and is himself the infinite model and source; and 
to secure this in every believer is the grand aim and ob- 
ject of the Gospel. For this purpose Christ died, the 
Holy Ghost is given, the means of grace instituted, and 
the Scriptures furnished. 

'^Holiness to the Lord'' — how rich, glorious, and 
promising this aspect of Zion! This will make her life 
more intensified, her spiritual vision more clear, her 
spirit more joyful and happy, and make her safe and 



HOLINESS TO THE LORD I3S 

useful. It will save her from fearful relapses and back* 
slidings, and send her on in her mighty mission in evan- 
gelizing this world for God. 

How strange, that some Methodists do not appear 
to favor this work! Perhaps few openly oppose it, but 
how many practically reject it when it is clearly and 
specifically presented, and urged home as a present duty 
and privilege ! Strange as it may appear, there is much 
of this in our ow^n loved Church. While God is bless- 
ing thousands of precious souls through the land, Satan 
is not idle ; and the old Moravian heresy is being taught 
again. There is great need of prayer and deep humilia- 
tion before God. How many, even among Methodists, 
treat this subject only in vague, ambiguous, indefinite 
generalities. How inconsistent to hold this precious doc- 
trine in our theological propositions, and yet refuse to 
recognize it in our interior religious life! 

Is not every Methodist preacher a son of that great 
and good man who said : "Therefore, let all our preach- 
^ers preach Christian perfection explicitly, clearly, con- 
stantly, and let all our people see to it that they agonize 
for it?'' The history of Methodism is a diary of Chris- 
tian holiness, cutting its way through the icy walls of a 
nominal Christianity; and he who would rob it of its 
clear and specific teachings on this subject is an un- 
worthy successor of the Wesleys. 



136 SUNSET ECHOES 



SANCTIFICATION THROUGH THE TRUTH. 

Christian Sanctification is through, or, by the truth. 
''Sanctify them,'' (said Christ), ''through thy truth. 
Thy word is truth/' "The truth," is the Word of God, 
which is truth itself, and is divine, eternal, and infallible. 
Christ, who declared Himself "the Truth," is the essen- 
tial, almighty "Word.". The gospel is the "word of 
truth," and is the grand instrument, in the hand of the 
Holy Ghost, of Christian sanctification. This "word of 
truth," becomes to every believing soul a sanctifying 
emanation from the Holy Spirit, and is the vehicle of 
divine power to a lost world. 

Religious truth is spiritual substance in religious 
things. "My truth," the truth of God, consists of the 
things of God as they are. Saving faith receives and 
appropriates these truths as they are, according to the 
revelation which God has made, and the soul is purified 
through their belief by the Spirit. Those truths are 
saving in their reception under the ministration of the 
Spirit, which, in the order of God, and the nature of 
things, stand related to personal salvation. 

God's word is the authorized directory to the ob- 
tainment of this gracious state. As such it declares its 
necessity. How clear. "Follow after peace with all 
men, and the sanctification without which no man shall 



SANCTIFICATION THROUGH THE TRUTH 1 37 

see the Lord.'' Heb. 12:12, R. V. 'Tor this is the will 
of God, even your sanctification," i Thess. 4:3. 

'The truth" directs to the efficient Agent in the work 
of purification, the Holy Spirit. ''God hath from the 
beginning chosen you to salvation, through sanctification 
of the Spirit, and belief of the truth,'' 2 Thess. 2:13. 
''Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth, 
through the Spirit," i Peter i \22, 

The word of truth points out the meritorious and 
procuring cause of sanctification, the atoning and effica- 
cious blood of Christ. His vicarious sacrifice as a sin 
oflFering is the central sanctifying truth of the gospel. 
"Who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us 
from all iniquity and purify unto Himself, a peculiar 
people, zealous of good works." Titus 2:14. "The 
blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin," 
I John 1 17. 

God's word of truth presents all needful hopes and 
motives, principles and inducements, to a life of holi- 
ness. 'T beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies 
of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, 
holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable 
service," Rom. 12:1. "Seeing that these things are thus 
all to be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to 
be in all holy living and godliness, looking for and 
earnestly desiring the coming of the day of God," 2 
Peter 3:11, R. V. Here we are taught that the amazing 



138 SUNSET ECHOES 

scenes of the final dissolution of earthly things should 
exert a deep and abiding influence on us, and prompt to 
a holy and sanctified life. 

The truth also gives us the receiving medium and 
immediate condition of sanctification ; 'Turifying their 
hearts by faith." The truth of God, received by faith, 
is brought into such vital contact with the heart, as to 
''purge it from dead (sinful) works to serve the living 
God.'' It is thus, we are sanctified ''by the belief of 
the truth.'' To "believe on the Lord Jesus Christ," is 
to believe the truth, and every evangelical truth, being a 
beam of the "sun of righteousness," is saving in its na- 
ture. When the believing soul receives any saving truth, 
then grace begins to "reign through righteousness unto 
eternal life by Jesus Christ." Christ in His incarnation, 
earthly life and death, was the embodiment of all sav- 
ing truth, and to entirely sanctify the soul, body and 
spirit of man, is the glorious objective point of the whole 
gospel system, inclusive of Christ's mission to our world. 

All entirely sanctified souls know experimentally these 
blessed truths. They see that God in Christ, is reveal- 
ed love; boundless, redeeming, pardoning, sanctifying 
and comforting love. They are "sanctified by the truth," 
and "rejoice in the truth." They are baptized "with the 
Spirit of faith," and triumph in Christ, "the living truth." 

The Bible system of human salvation makes ample 
provision for the removal of all sin and pollution, and 



SANCTIFICATION THROUGPI THE TRUTH 1 39 

makes no allowance for any sin. Gospel salvation is 
salvation from sin, and never salvation in sin. Nothing 
can answer as a substitute for personal sanctification ; 
no measure of benevolence, no fasting, no Christian 
works nor ordinances can answer as a substitute. These 
are valuable only as means of grace, to lead us to Christ, 
the truth, for personal purification. 

Sanctification constitutes the only preparation for 
paradise. This preparation is to be accomplished here, 
in this world, now, not in death, not in the grave, not 
at the resurrection, not in heaven, Sanctification is to 
be wrought in the church militant, some time between 
regeneration and death. A complete deliverance from 
inbred sin must take place before we go hence. 

To make us holy is the great design of Christianity. 
For this the Son of God bled and died. For this He ever 
lives to make intercession for us. For this the Holy 
Spirit is given, and to cleanse and save us from sin is 
the main object of His gracious work. 



I40 SUNSET ECHOES 



CHARITY AND HUMILITY. 

Much has been written and said during the past 
forty years upon the subject of Entire Sanctification, 
more than ever before in the same length of time, in the 
history of the Church. This has been beneficial in call- 
ing general attention to the subject, and arousing the 
Church to the importance of a more thoroughly intensi- 
fied spiritual life. 

Many Christians, in all branches of the church, have 
been led to seek a better religious experience, and have 
taken advanced ground in both theory and practice on 
the subject of Christian holiness. The conviction has 
become more general in all Christian lands, that the 
children of God should be holy, and possess the dis- 
tinctive traits of Christian character, and the graces of 
the Spirit in their fullest perfection. Good men every- 
where, are seeing more clearly, that for the accomplish- 
ment of her great work, the church must have a deeper 
experience, a greater enduement of power and a more 
complete conformity to the divine will. 

While this pressing need is clearly seen and deeply 
felt, yet there appears a growing inclination on the part 
of some to complain of those who either seek the expe- 
rience and make profession of its attainment, or recom- 
mend others to give the subject special attention. These 



CHARITY AND HUMILITY I4I 

are often represented as ''full of self-complacency/' ''self- 
confidence/' and "possessed of a dogmatic and censori- 
ous spirit/' 

No doubt, in manner, spirit and mattery much of 
human imperfection has mingled with all that has been 
written or said regarding Christiaii sanctification. This 
is true of all subjects commanding human thought and 
activity. Nor is it denied, that some occasions have been 
given for the complaints heard, though they are often 
more imaginary than real, and not unfrequently have no 
foundation in fact. 

We by no means claim, that all the efforts of the 
friends of holiness are exempt from human frailties; in- 
deed, we are painfully sensible that it is otherwise; but, 
that the complaints so often made, are facts to the ex- 
tent represented, we do not believe, as many of those 
we see in, print, we know to be without foundation. 

The spirit, we hear, often attributed to the special 
advocates of full redemption, we do not approve, we do 
not encourage, and if seen we deplore and denounce. 
After more than a score of years with a very extended 
range of observation, we must say, we have not heard 
the many foolish, the many unwise and bitter things so 
frequently attributed to those teaching Entire Sanctifi- 
cation. Those devoted to this work are not blind to their 
danger, nor are they living without much watchfulness 
and prayer. They claim no perfection of manner, and 



142 SUNSET ECHOES 

are open to conviction of wrong of any kind, or of impro- 
prieties in any respect. Like all honest and earnest 
Christians, they can say, ''Let the righteous smite me; 
it shall be a kindness; let him reprove me; it shall be 
an excellent oil, which shall not break my head." 

Even in rebuking censoriousness, dogmatism, and 
self-confidence in others, we should carefully guard 
against being ourselves censorious, dogmatic, or self- 
confident. 

It must be admitted, that there are very many for- 
mal, worldly, inactive and backslidden members in the 
church, and many plain things have been said and writ- 
ten (and very justly so), and no doubt, such as have 
assumed themselves assailed, have been under great 
temptation to impute a ''spirit of pride,'' "self-compla- 
cency," or "censoriousness," to those whom they have 
deemed their assailants, even though there may have 
been no grounds for such opinions. 

It may be remembered, that no man ever pressed the 
church to be less worldly and more godly, without pro- 
voking the censure of some in the church. History, 
sacred or profane,, furnishes no such examples. Christ, 
our blessed Lord, was constantly misrepresented and 
vilified. The apostles were called "babblers," and 
"fools," and represented as "mad," "drunk," and "be- 
side themselves." The Scribes and Pharisees, thought 
St. Paul "self-righteous" when he declared to them, "I 



CHARITY AND HUMILITY I43 

have lived in all good conscience before God/' When 
they read from his pen, proclaiming to the world, ''I 
can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth 
me," they doubtless thought him puffed up with self- 
conceit, and ''in the very snare of the devil/' Martin 
Luther, John Wesley, John Fletcher and Jonathan Ed- 
wards, did not escape the most severe imputations. 

In the nature of things, any Christian who does his 
whole duty to the church and the world in their pres- 
ent state, speaking to them, and of them, as they really 
are, will incur the charge of censoriousness. Entire 
Sanctification implies the doing all our duty. In doing 
it, the facts respecting the church, the world, and the 
truth are to be treated with sincerity, honesty, and faith- 
fulness ; and this, in many cases, cannot be done without 
giving offense and incurring the charge of censorious- 
ness. To maintain the contrary would impeach the wis- 
dom and holiness of Jesus Christ himself. 

So important and definite are the provisions for spir- 
itual cleansing, and so precious the blessing, it is very 
easy and natural to speak and write strongly and 
earnestly with regard to it, and we may possibly at times 
expose ourselves to the imputations in question. Chris- 
tian ministers have always been exposed to such charges, 
and those the most faithful and useful the most so. The 
truth uttered so as to be efficient, must be uttered in a 
manner indicating importance, certainty and assurance. 



144 SUNSET ECHOES 

All good men have been painfully impressed with 
the difficulty of rebuking wickedness, and exposing falla- 
cious and injurious sentiments in such a way as to avoid 
''all appearance of evil'' 



REASONS WHY MORE ARE NOT ENTIRELY 
SANCTIFIED. 

One reason is, people are not willing to cleanse them- 
selves. Here is a part of the purification, in entire sanc- 
tification which every one must perform for himself. 
All ''filthiness of the flesh" belongs to this class. God 
never does for any one what he can and ought to do 
himself. 

The Lord requires not only holiness of heart, but 
purity of the body as well; and these in Christian sanc- 
tification must be united, and always are when the work 
is genuine. There is much physical depravity as well 
as moral depravity among partially purified saints. En- 
tire sanctification includes a radical and universal purifi- 
cation of the entire man — soul and body. Hence, the 
body as well as the soul must be sanctified, and be kept 
clean and pure for God's service. 

We are not to forget, that chastity of body is an im- 
portant part of our sanctification. Sin is ''filthiness,'' it 
may be of the ileshj or of the spirit, as there are defile- 
ments of the body and of the mind. There are sins of 
the "flesJi' of v/hich the body is the instrument, or that 



REASONS WHY MORE ARE NOT SANCTIFIED I45 

are committed by the body ; and sins of the spirit, which 
are confined to the heart, and never develop in the outer 
life. We may and must be cleansed from both as God 
is to be glorified with both body and soul. 

Doubtless many refuse to seek Christian holiness, be- 
cause of habits of uncleanness, ''filthiness of the flesh/' 
or physical indulgences, which they are unwilling to 
give up or put away. No man can be entirely sancti- 
fied while his body is an ''instrument of unrighteous- 
ness/' in any sense, whether public or private. 

God requires a pure soul in a chaste body. He made 
our bodies ; they have been purchased for Him by the 
death of Christ, and they are not our own. ''Ye are not 
your own, ye are bought with a price.'' The Christian's 
body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, and it is not to 
be profaned by prostitution to wicked uses, or filthy 
lusts. "H any man defile the temple of God, him shall 
God destroy." 

Having made both body and soul, and redeemed both, 
He requires them kept as vessels fitted (purified) for 
His use. "Therefore glorify God in your body, and in 
your spirit, which are God's." 

Many fail of entire sanctification, because they do not 
come out from among the ungodly, nor separate them- 
selves from sinners. They are constantly touching, tast- 
ing or handling something that is unclean. Multitudes 
cannot be right with God, because they are wrong with 



146 SUNSET ECHOES 

men. There is much to be done in relation to our fellow- 
men, which we ourselves alone can do. This includes 
honesty, honor, uprightness, and all natural and moral 
virtues, as well as freedom from all unhallowed alliances 
with wicked men. There can be no purity, or spiritual 
life apart from outward morality. 

Convictions, resolutions and good desires are not 
enough; there must be actual abandonment of all ini- 
quity, and postitive trusting the atonement of Christ that 
alone can sanctify the soul. 

In repentance we turn from a life of sin, and put away 
all that can outwardly defile us; in regeneration the 
power of sinful habit is broken, and the new life, with 
the principle of holiness is implanted. The regenerate, 
in the light of the Holy Spirit and God's word, discovers 
in himself a remaining sinful nature, that pride, impa- 
tience, selfishness, and the love of the world are still 
within him, and hence, the need of a further cleans- 
ing in order to his purity — that he may be ''without spot, 
or wrinkle, or any such thing.'' In entire sanctification 
the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth the soul from all in- 
bred sin, so that the whole nature, ''spirit, soul and body," 
is pervaded with the Spirit of holiness. 



NEEDLESS SINGULARITIES 14/ 



NEEDLESS SINGULARITIES. 

Christian sanctification, though not identical with 
culture, social refinement and mere outside appearance, 
tends to promote every phase of manly, commendable 
excellence. Other circumstances being equal it will im- 
prove any man, every way and all ways. 

It is to be regretted that some who claim to pos- 
sess this purifying, ennobling grace are very careless in 
extravagant singularities, and in that way detract much 
from their usefulness. All who enjoy or claim to pos- 
sess Christian purity should studiously avoid all things, 
little and great, that destroy the confidence of thoughtful 
people in them. Needless singularity is no mark of emi- 
nent holiness. 

We ouglit to be all things to all men, in all matters 
where no questions of conscience are involved. In things 
perfectly indifferent we should conform to the customs 
and notions of those around us. This should be done 
just so far as we can do it with a good conscience and 
no further. St. Paul did this "for the gospel sake,'' 
''that he might by all means save some." (See i Cor. 
8:10-26.) We are not to yield at all to the customs or 
influences of others where personal duties and questions 
of enlightened conscience are concerned. In such in- 



148 SUNSET ECHOES 

stances, with meekness and humility, we are to be in- 
flexible and as unbending as Cesar's reed. 

When our duty, our conscience and the plain Word 
of God require it, then we must be unyielding no mat- 
ter how singular or different it may make us from oth- 
ers. There is a sense, as Mr. Wesley says, in which ''we 
must be singular or be damned." Every holy life will 
appear singular to wicked men. 'There are several acts 
of holiness,'' says Rev. William Burkitt, "which the pro- 
fane world would esteem as madness, such as eminent 
self-denial, great seriousness in religion, their burning 
zeal, their holy singularity, their fervor of devotion, their 
patience and meekness under sufferings and reproaches.'' 
This blind and wicked world has always accounted re- 
ligion as madness and frenzy. Even the apostles were 
said to be "mad," "drunk," and "beside themselves" they 
were called "babblers," "fools" and "fanatics." 

While profound devotion to God will make us singu- 
lar, different from others and separate from the world, 
it is to be feared some have made themselves odd, er- 
ratic and needlessly singular, for the sake of being 
singular and appearing eminently holy. This is a blun- 
der that ought to be avoided. If Satan fails to keep us 
from coming out from the world, and of being separate 
from the world, he seeks to lead us clear over the line into 
needless singularity and extravagances. In this way he 
excites ridicule and contempt against real godliness. 



NEEDLESS SINGULARITIES 149 

There should be no just grounds for this, and we should 
be wise as well as '^pure in heart." 

When we are needlessly singular in things purely 
indifferent, and are careless, slovenly and disgusting in 
crude oddities, in sensible people we create aversion and 
hatred against the doctrine and experience we would 
promote. Let all the professors of holiness, evince grav- 
ity, simplicity, modesty and decency. Let us pray_ for 
godly wisdom to avoid unnecessary awkwardness, slov- 
enliness, sectarian cant, extreme mannerisms and pro- 
fusion of witticisms. These are no manifestations or 
evidences of either justification or sanctiiication. 

Let us study the Bible that our judgments may be 
enlightened, that we may ''abstain from all appearance of 
evil.'' The Bible ! the blessed Bible ! is to be our in- 
structor. It will teach us the true, the wise and the 
right way. The Bible and the Holy Spirit will guide 
us into all needful truth. Let us be Biblical in spirit 
and life, and avoid all foolish, outlandish mannerisms, and 
not give occasion for the good that is in us to be evil 
spoken of. God hath said, 'Tf any of you lack wisdom, 
let him ask of God, and it shall be given him.'' Let us 
ask for it. 



150 SUNSET ECHOES 

''SINLESS PERFECTION.'' 

It is often asserted that those who hold the doctrine 
and experience of entire sanctification beHeve in ''sin- 
less perfection'' and teach its attainableness. This mis- 
representation has been asserted over and over again, 
and by those who ought to know better. Those who re- 
ject the doctrine of Christian perfection will have it that 
we mean by it absolute or sinless perfection. Many who 
at times teach substantially just what we hold will op- 
pose us, assuming that we believe in absolute perfection. 

In a most excellent sermon by Dr. R. S. MacArthur, 
of the Calvary Baptist Church, New York, we have the 
following: ''Do I here advocate doctrines of sinless 
perfection? If I did the verse following the text would 
rebuke me and contradict my teaching. In that verse 
it is distinctly said, 'If we say that we have not sinned, 
we make God a liar, and his word is not in us.' No 
man may claim sinless perfection. Such a claim as this 
the Apostle Paul never made, but distinctly repudiated." 

While we repudiate the term sinless perfection in en- 
tire sanctification, we fail to see how Dr. MacArthur's 
proof-text meets the case. "If we say that we have 
not sinned," etc., in i John i:io, has reference to sin- 
ning before God "forgives our sins, and cleanses us from 
all unrighteousness," and not after our pardon and puri- 



SINLESS PERFECTION I5I 

fication. If he teaches that pardoned and purified Chris- 
tians live in sin, and are sinning in any proper sense of 
those terms and in that view discards sinless perfection, 
we disclaim any such sentiment on that account. 

If by sinless perfection be meant infallibilty, or a 
state in which the soul cannot sin, we know of no one 
who holds any such nonsense, although it has been as- 
serted over and over a thousand times by those opposed 
to Christian perfection. 

If sinless perfection is understood to mean a perfect 
fulfillment of the Paradisiacal law of innocence and free- 
dom from all involuntary transgressions of the law of 
love, we teach no such perfection. Mr. Wesley says, 
'Therefore, sinless perfection is a phrase I never use, 
lest I should seem to contradict myself. I believe a per- 
son filled with the love of God is still liable to these in- 
voluntary transgressions you may call sins, if you please ; 
I do not.'' ('Tlain Account," p. 67.) 

On the contrary, if by this objectionable phrase be 
understood a perfect observance of the evangelical law 
of love, so as to love God with all the heart, soul and 
strength, this we believe the duty and privilege of every 
child of God. (See Deut. 30:6.) 

If those who object to this term mean by it a gra- 
cious, moral condition in which the soul has no disposi- 
tion to sin and will not sin, and by the grace of God is 
kept from sinning, in this sense we cannot object to it. 



152 SUNSET ECHOES 

We give the following from Dr. MacArthur's ser- 
mon, which is just as all true Methodists teach: ''For- 
giveness were an indescribable blessing, but cleansing 
introduces us into a nobler condition and a sweeter re- 
lation. To forgive is to justify, but to cleanse is to 
sanctify as well as justify. . . . For purification as 
well as pardon we must constantly strive. Careful study 
of the text (i John i :g) shows us that it is a personal 
cleansing. The promise is that He will cleanse us from 
all unrighteousness. . . . There must be a personal 
cleansing in the fountain opened for sin and cleansing. 
To that fountain I now invite you. Oh! come, wash 
and be clean now ; yea, wash and be whiter than snow ! 
• . . There is only one fountain that can wash away 
the stain of sin. Oh, come to that fountain now, wash 
and be clean. We observe also that it is a perfect cleans- 
ing — 'cleanse us from all unrighteousness.' The sin 
which abides in the heart as conscious guilt may be re- 
moved by God's pardon. The sin which abides in us as 
pollution requires divine cleansing. ... It is the 
duty and privilege of every child of God to have his 
heart cleansed from remaining depravity, and to keep 
himself unspotted from the world." Here we have from 
this eminent Baptist divine the doctrine of entire sanc- 
tification just as it is held by the advocates of Christian 
sanctification in the Methodist Church and in all the 
holiness associations. But we believe not only in teach- 



MISTAKES REGARDING ENTIRE SANCTIFICATION 1 53 

ing it, but in obtaining it, living in it and glorifying God 
in its possession. 



MISTAKES REGARDING ENTIRE SANCTIFICA^ 

TION. 

A very common mistake among many professing 
Christians is in overrating Christian sanctification. While 
some underrate it many more overrate it; they can 
hardly think of a perfect Christian or a holy man as 
anything less than an angelic being in human shape. 
They do not seem to think that the words ''perfection," 
^'holiness" and ''sanctification'' used in this connection are 
modified by the term Christian. It is Christian holiness. 
Christian perfection and Christian sanctification. It is 
not angelic nor Adamic. 

All the works of God are perfect in their order and 
various kinds. There is a gradation which belongs to 
all the works of God, and hence there are various kinds 
and degrees of perfection. Each sphere of being has 
its normal limits; God alone has absolute, infinite per- 
fection; angels are perfect in their order and sphere, 
but they fall infinitely below the perfection of God. Man 
has his sphere, and though fallen, in the mediatorial econ- 
omy his present highest, practicable rectitude is his per- 
fection — and is Christian perfection. 

A Christian who is wholly sanctified is perfect as a 
Christian, not perfect as an angel, nor as perfect as he 



154 SUNSET ECHOES 

will be when he goes where the angels are. Christ de- 
clares that he will then be ''equal unto the angels." 
Here in this life we are to be ''perfect in love/' in grace 
and the graces of a Christian. 

In this life all who are entirely sanctified are pos- 
sessed of a frail body and infirmities of mind. Our 
bodies and souls are closely united, and whatever affects 
the one affects the other. Whatever the moral condi- 
tion of our souls, the frailty of our bodies often weak- 
ens our animation of mind, depresses our spirits, taxes our 
patience and produces heaviness though the heart re- 
tains its purity and integrity. 

The infirmities of the mind are many in this life 
even in the holiest of men. There is weakness of under- 
standing, slowness of apprehension, frailty of mem- 
ory, irregular imagination and imperfect judgment. 
These affect all men, good or bad, more 
or less in our present state of being. These 
cause many imperfections in conduct which are 
not sins, and do not necessarily affect the holiness of the 
heart. The purest and wisest of men are subjects of 
much ignorance, as it is not given to any man to know 
everything, and consequently all are liable to errors and 
mistakes, and these lead to errors in life and practice in 
things which have no moral quality, and hence are not 
sinful or transgressions of the law of love. As a sam- 
ple, a holy man may be sick and take a medicine which 



SANCTIFICATION DISTINCT FROM REGENERATION 1 55 

he hopes will cure him, but it hastens him out of the 
world. Another is misinformed concerning the charac- 
ter of a person, and consequently treats him with more 
or less confidence than is wise and proper. A thousand 
similar mistakes may occur in those cleansed from all 
sin, and in possession of pure love to God and their neigh- 
bor. 



ENTIRE SANCTIFICATION DISTINCT FROM 
JUSTIFICATION AND REGENERATION. 

Justification and regeneration precede and lay the 
foundation for entire sanctification, and there is a transi- 
tion from regeneration to complete purification. 

Justification and the forgiveness of sins are synony- 
mous. Each express an act of mercy in the mind of God, 
that blots out our actual transgressions and absolves us 
from all guilt. All such can say : 'There is therefore now 
no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus,'' and 
''Being justified (pardoned) by faith we have peace 
with God.'' 

"Regeneration," "Born again," "Born of the Spirit," 
"Born from above," signify the renewal of our nature 
and the impartation of spiritual life, a work wrought 
in the soul, which accompanies justification, and is one 
of the evidences of it. 

"Sanctification," "wholly sanctified," "perfection," 
"perfect holiness," "perfect love," imply a personal 



156 SUNSET ECHOES 

cleansing or moral condition as distinctly known, and 
identified with as much certainty as justification and re- 
generation. It has its marks and signs and evidences 
as a distinct work. 

There is as clear and distinct conviction in the re- 
generate preceding entire sanctification, as that which 
preceded justification or pardon in the penitent sinner. 
In the one case it is conviction of guilt and need of par- 
don, and in the other it is conviction of ''inbred sin," and 
need of purity. 

Soon after regeneration, the conviction is felt, though 
converted and forgiven, that there still remains in the 
heart ''indwelling sin," real, living, stirring bosom evils, 
which need extermination. After conversion the mind 
is enlightened to see more clearly its own natural deprav- 
ity, moral condition and deficiency. The extent and 
purity of God's law is seen more clearly, and the neces- 
sity of a purified heart to obey its precepts and love 
God with all the heart. 

After conversion the conscience becomes more ten- 
der and active, and the cravings of the soul for com- 
munion and fellowship with God become more intense. 
In this condition there is a conviction of moral deficiency, 
and the need of entire sanctification, and a desire for it, 
which is a spontaneity in the regenerate heart. 

Sometimes, the distress and struggles of the Christian 
believer seeking purity, or deliverance from indwelling 



SANCTIFICATION DISTINCT FROM REGENERATION 157 

sin, are more severe than those in seeking pardoning 
mercy. This is frequently the case with those who were 
converted in early life, and never had those painful and 
overwhelming convictions which some have. 

Some believers are convicted for years of their need 
of full cleansing before they receive it, while others 
very soon after their conversion seek and obtain clean 
hearts. Some grieve the Holy Spirit by refusing to 
yield to His influences and they become cold, formal and 
gradually backslide from God. The Holy Spirit and the 
Bible show them their great privilege and duty, and 
through unbelief, or prejudice, or Satanic influences, 
they refuse to follow their light, and like ancient Israel, 
while in sight of the promised land, give way to unbe- 
lief, and wander in the wilderness for years to come. 

Others see their privilege and duty, and admit it, but 
are not willing to fully submit to God, or give up their 
bosom sins. They keep back part of the price, like 
poor Ananias and Sapphira, and if they are not struck 
dead at once, they become lukewarm and spiritually 
dead, and unless they repent and return to God, will 
utterly apostatize. This is the class in our churches who 
are full of doubts, sore conflicts, trials, severe tempta- 
tions and dissatisfaction. 

On the contrary, those who walk in the light, yield 
fully to God, and trust in the promise and blood of 
Jesus, experience a radical purification from all moral 



158 SUNSfeT ECHOES 

corruption, and enjoy ''the fullness of the blessing of 
Christ/' The evidences of their purification are as clear 
and assuring as those of their justification, with its at- 
tendant blessings. Purity of heart is as strongly and 
clearly marked, as the regeneration of the heart, and is 
as divinely attested by the witness of the Spirit. 



THE HOLINESS AND HAPPINESS OF ALL MEN. 

I desire to present some thoughts on the question of 
the holiness and happiness of all men. I make no claim 
to special originality, but aim to present the truth gath- 
ered from any source available, without regard to quo- 
tation marks or names, which would add nothing to 
their strength of logic, truth or argument. The in- 
spired direction is: "Let no man deceive you with vain 
words : for because of these things cometh the wrath of 
God upon the children of disobedience.'' — Eph. 5 : 6. 

Are all men to be finally holy and happy? This is 
the most momentous question which ever engaged the at- 
tention of man. It involves interests as high as heaven 
and as lasting as immortality. The settlement of this 
question is connected with the dearest interests of our 
spirits while the throne of God shall stand or angels 
sing. 

In this question each and all have a common inter- 
est. Such is the magnitude of the interests involved; 
in discussing the subject there should be the utmost can- 



THE HOLINESS AND HAPPINESS OF ALL MEN 1 59 

dor and thoroughness. Lightness in the treatment of 
such a subject is seriously out of place. The flippant and 
careless manner in which some treat it commends itself 
to no reverent or candid mind. 

I desire to consider the most common and plausible 
arguments presented in favor of the salvation of all men, 
and against the future and endless punishment of the 
finally impenitent. 

It is argued and claimed by some that all men will 
finally be holy and happy, drawn from the perfections of 
God. All will admit that all the divine perfections are in- 
finite and in view of our incapacity to comprehend in- 
finity, it cannot be claimed that God can make a full 
revelation of his perfections to us. The moral and natural 
attributes of God can be fully known only by himself. If 
this be so any conclusions drawn from the divine per- 
fections, are drawn from premises which we do not fully 
understand. Such conclusions, in the nature of the case, 
must be as uncertain as our knowledge of the premises 
is imperfect. A false method necessarily leads to a false 
conclusion. 

In this way men often reason as follows: God is 
infinitely good and God is infinitely powerful. As he is 
infinitely good, he would not create his creatures subject 
to any evil whatever; and as he is infinitely powerful, 
he can accomplish all his purposes; therefore all his 
creatures are free from all evil and perfectly happy. 



l60 SUNSET ECHOES 

This method of reasoning leads to conclusions contradict- 
ed by nature and revelation. 

We can determine what is and what is not consistent 
with the perfections of God only by what we know and 
see to actually exist, or from what God has revealed in the 
Scriptures. If it can be proved from facts as they actual- 
ly exist, or from the Bible, that all men will be saved, then 
we must admit that it is consistent with the divine per- 
fections to save all men, including all those who reject 
Christ, and die in sin and rejection of his authority. 

On the other hand, if present facts indicate and the 
Bible positively teaches, that some men, through their 
sins and rejection of Christ, will be ''punished with ever- 
lasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and 
from the glory of his power,'' it must be admitted that 
eternal punishment may be consistent with the divine at- 
tributes, though we may not be able to see the reason in 
those perfections why it should be so. We see many 
things and facts in the providence of God for which 
we can see no reason in the divine attributes. 

If the perfections of God would enable us to deter- 
mine just the demerit and desert of sin, then it might 
be made to appear that ''eternal damnation" is incon- 
sistent with divine justice and goodness. Who, but God 
can determine the turpitude, criminality and the extent 
of the evil of sin, and what and how much punishment 



THE HOLINESS AND HAPPINESS OF ALL MEN l6l 

the sinner is liable to endure ? As God views it he asks, 
''How can ye escape the damnation of hell?'' 

No man can prove from the perfection of God, inde- 
pendently of revelation, either the immortality of the soul, 
the resurrection of the body or a future state ; how, then, 
can he prove from them the final salvation of all men? 
The perfections of God, if they prove anything on this 
subject, prove the doctrine of future retribution. We 
know that whatever does exist, must exist consistent with 
the divine perfections. We cannot prove from those per- 
fections that the existence of sin and misery is consist- 
ent with such perfections, yet this can be proved from 
fact ; for sin and misery do exist, and therefore we know 
from their actual existence that they can exist consistent- 
ly with the perfections of God. 

Facts bear only on one side of this question, hence, 
matter of fact cannot prove that it is consistent with the 
perfections of God to save all men, whatever may be their 
conduct, for all men are not now saved. Sin and misery 
have existed for six thousand years and now exist, and 
hence their existence must be consistent with the divine 
attributes, and as those attributes are unchangeable, the 
inference is a fair one that it may always be consistent 
with the divine perfections that sin and misery should 
exist. 

It is claimed that all men will be finally holy and 
happy because ''God is love" and infinitely benevolent, and 



l62 SUNSET ECHOES 

that his love is undenved and eternal. We admit the in- 
finite love of God and also that it is underived and eternal ; 
but deny that it follows from thence that all men will be- 
come holy and happy. God's infinite love has always ex- 
isted, and as it did not originally prevent sin and misery, 
but has permitted it for thousands of years past, how can 
it be shown that his love will save those of whom Christ 
declares, 'They shall be forgiven neither in this world, 
neither in the world to come?'' 

As God's infinite love and wisdom did not keep man 
holy and happy when he was so, how can it be shown the 
final holiness and happiness of all men will be secured 
by his love and wisdom? The argument drawn from 
the love and wisdom of God would have applied to Adam 
and Eve in Eden, in proof that they could never become 
unholy and unhappy with the same propriety that it does 
to us in proof that we cannot remain unholy and unhappy. 
All can see that this argument will apply backward to the 
condition of men for six thousand years past, as well as 
forward to his condition for six thousand or more years 
to come. As the argument is false as to what is past and 
present, how can it be relied upon to prove what is to 
come? 

For God to be love is one thing, and for intelligent, 
voluntary accountable beings to insult and reject that 
love is another thing. St. Paul says, ''If any man love 
not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be accursed." God 



THE HOLINESS AND HAPPINESS OF ALL MEN 163 

loves all men as his creatures ; but all men do not love God 
as their Creator. God loves sinners now, but sinners do 
not love God, and no man can be holy and happy who 
does not love God. The objector should prove that all 
men will love God endlessly, and not assume that be- 
cause God's love is endless, all men on that account will 
be holy and happy. If present infinite love and wisdom 
do not secure the present holiness and happiness of the 
sinner, it is assuming too much that endless love and 
wisdom will produce endless holiness and happiness. 

It is claimed that all men will finally become holy and 
happy because of the almighty power of God. That God 
is almighty, no one disputes, but what God can do when 
his power alone is consulted, and what he can consistently 
do in view of all the perfections of his nature and the na- 
ture and relation of responsible moral intelligences, are 
quite different from each other. Power is ability to per- 
form. God has power to do anything that is an object 
of physical force, or anything which, in the nature of 
things, can be done. His almighty powder is guided by 
his infinite wisdom, and it never breaks over the sacred 
bounds of eternal truth. It is no limitation of divine om- 
nipotence to say it cannot work contradictions. To say 
that God can work contradictions would not magnify his 
power, but expose our own absurdity. Omnipotence can- 
not cause a thing to be, or not to be, at the same time ; 



164 SUNSET ECHOES 

or make two and two equal five. Such things are ab- 
surdities, and not the objects of power. 

Omnipotence cannot necessitate virtue. A necessitated 
virtue would be a contradiction and an absurdity. Noth- 
ing can be virtue which is produced by extraneous phys- 
ical force. Universal reason and consciousness affirm 
this. A necessitated volition is a contradiction in terms. 
It is absurd to suppose that moral and accountable agents 
can be governed and made virtuous in another way than 
by moral means. It is not more absurd to suppose that 
God could swing the worlds through space by moral 
power than to suppose that he governs the moral uni- 
verse by physical power. 

Physical power, guided by infinite wisdom and good- 
ness, has created moral beings and endowed them with 
the most exalted attributes and moral powers; but the 
virtue or holiness of such responsible beings does not con- 
sist in the possession of such moral powers, but in the 
right and obedient exercise of those powers. 

A necessitated virtue being an absurdity, a contradic- 
tion in terms, it is clear that sin and woe may enter into 
the best moral world, and the divine perfections are con- 
sistent with their existence. We are willing to admit that 
God might have avoided sin by putting man lower in the 
scale of being; by filling the world with uncounted mil- 
lions of idiots, or with creatures even lower down than 
idiots ; but he has not seen wise to do it. If virtue and 



THE HOLINESS AND HAPPINESS OF ALL MEN 165 

happiness could be necessitated in all moral, voluntary 
intelligences, no doubt but God would cause them to 
shine out in all parts of his dominion, and not a blot of 
sin would be seen upon the beauty of the world. 

God's abhorrence of sin and his approbation of virtue 
are seen in the dispensations of natural good and evil, 
of pleasure and pain. The design of this divine arrange- 
ment is to prevent the commission of sin and secure the 
practice of virtue, which cannot be produced by the direct 
omnipotency of his power. There is a sense in which God 
sincerely desires the happiness of all men, just as he sin- 
cerely desires all men to obey him ; but his desire for their 
happiness will not be secured, just as his desire that all 
men shall love him and obey him, and do his will now, is 
not secured; because it is impossible in the nature of 
things to necessitate voluntary obedience or holiness. 

God does the best that infinite wisdom and goodness 
can do for the happiness and well-being of all his crea- 
tures ; but voluntary agents have the power to obstinately 
work out their own ruin and destruction. Omnipotence 
cannot, in the nature of the case, confer holiness and hap- 
piness upon them (that being a question of voluntary 
agency and not of omnipotent power), and they do not 
choose to acquire it. All such are asked, ''What more 
could I have done for my vineyard, that I have not done 
in it?" 

It is not true that all men are always punished for 



l66 SUNSET ECHOES 

their own good. A felon is not incarcerated, or a mur- 
derer put to death for his own benefit. State prisons 
are built for the good of community and the protection 
of the innocent, and not for the correction and well be- 
ing of criminals. God did not drown the antediluvians, 
nor burn Sodom for their correction and benefit, but as 
he tells us: "Making them an example unto those that 
after should live ungodly.'' 2 Peter 2:4. 

If punishment for a single year is justified on the 
ground that it is necessary to support government for 
a single year, is endless punishment in support of the 
eternal moral government of God, a greater anomaly than 
temporal punishments in relation to temporal govern- 
ments? If temporal punishments are justified because 
they are necessary to meet the exigencies and uphold 
the interests of temporal governments, it cannot be 
shown that eternal punishments may not be justified in 
relation to an eternal government. 

The idea that all punishment is corrective entirely 
overlooks the sinner's desert. What the sinner deserves 
as a just punishment for his sins and what he needs as a 
remedy for his spiritual disease, are two distinct points 
vastly different from each other. To suppose that all 
punishment is designed to make the sinner better, is to 
say that he deserves no punishment as a reward for his 
sins, but needs it as a remedy for his disease. This is 
both absurd and unscriptural. The Scriptures represent 



THE HOLINESS AND HAPPINESS OF ALL MEN 167 

the sinner as guilty and deserving of punishment, and 
his punishment as a curse and not a blessing. 

The Bible tells us: ''Christ hath redeemed us from 
the curse of the law'' — Gal. 3:13. By the curse of the 
law, must be meant penalty or punishment. If all pun- 
ishment is reformatory, then Christ redeemed us from 
what would have done us good. ''Who hath warned you 
to flee from wrath to come?'' Matt. 3:7. Matthew, 
here must mean punishment. "The law worketh wrath." 
Rom. 4:15. How can this be if punishment is a merci- 
ful remedy for our spiritual diseases? St. James says, 
"Sin when it is finished bringeth forth death." This 
popular argument says, when sin is finished it bringeth 
forth life. Which is right? 

"Who shall be punished with everlasting destruc- 
tion." 2 Thess. 1 19. What then is the everlasting de- 
struction with which the sinner is threatened? Accord- 
ing to this argument, it is the only gracious and efficient 
means which God can employ to make sinners good and 
happy. 

If all punishment is corrective, then w^hen punish- 
ment ceases to be corrective, it ceases to be just; and 
all incorrigible transgressors, who are made no better 
by punishment, are unjustly punished and should be re- 
leased at once, because they are too inveterate to be re- 
formed. This would throw all our prison doors open at 
once to a large share of their inmates. 



l68 SUNSET ECHOES 

The Scriptures represent the sinner as being pun- 
ished according to his works and not according to his 
wants. Every man is represented as receiving *'accord- 
ing to that he hath done in the body" and not to that 
which is necessary to save him. Christ says, "Behold 
I come quickly and my reward is with me to give to 
every man according as his works shall be/' not accord- 
ing to what is necessary to bring him to repentance. The 
sinner is said to be cursed, to be ptmished, to endure 
''wrath,'' wrath without mixture," indignation, and to 
perish. If all these are only for the sinner's good, then 
are wrath and love the same ; then between vengeance and 
mercy there is no difference, then an effect proves a 
remedy for its cause, then is a curse a blessing and death 
leads to life. 

The dispensations of natural providence, as well as 
the express declarations of the Bible, forbid the infer- 
ence that God desires the happiness of those who obsti- 
nately persist in sin. Their united language is, 'Woe 
unto the wicked, it shall be ill with him." God desires 
the happiness of the obedient and virtuous; "Say ye to 
the righteous it shall be well with him." 

The error of the argument drawn from the father- 
hood of God, is in magnifying the paternal character of 
God, at the expense of His infinite holiness and justice, 
as the sovereign ruler and judge of the universe. While 



THE HOLINESS AND HAPPINESS OF ALL MEN 169 

God, by creation and providence, is the father of all 
men, He is also law giver, ruler and judge of all men. 

Any argument that destroys or obscures the immut- 
able harmony and equality of the divine perfections. His 
justice, holiness and truth, as well as His goodness, wis- 
dom and fatherhood must be dangerously false. In this 
argument the love and paternal character of God are 
so exalted as to render his other perfections and his re- 
lations to man subservient to these in order to reach the 
conclusion that all men will become holy and happy. By 
the same process of reasoning from the holiness, justice 
and truth of God (which are infinite), a directly oppo- 
site conclusion may be obtained. 

For example: The infinite justice and holiness of God 
must prompt Him to inflict the greatest possible punish- 
ment upon all who violate His law and oppose His 
holiness. All sinners have insulted the infinite holiness 
of God, violated His holy law, and are amenable to His 
infinite justice. God's infinite holiness and justice can- 
not be impeached, therefore all incorrigible sinners must 
be eternally miserable. This argument from the jus- 
tice and holiness of God for the ''eternal damnation" of 
the widced, is just as strong as that drawn from the 
goodness and love of God for the ''eternal salvation'' of 
all men. 

Any mode of reasoning that will support conclusions 
so diametrically opposite, is too weak to rest our hopes 



170 SUNSET ECHOES 

of heaven upon. It is not true that all men are the 
children of God in the paternal, religious sense that 
Christians are, who are ''born of that spirit" and are the 
"sons of God.'' Adam was a son of God, in a sense his 
posterity are not. God was his immediate creator, both 
of body and soul, and he was created holy and pos- 
sessed the moral image of God ; but he sinned, forfeited 
the image of God, incurred His displeasure and became 
an outlaw and plunged his posterity into a state of moral 
degeneracy, in which they can become the children of 
God only by grace, adoption and salvation ; see Rom. 
8: 15; John 8: 47. Men, in their sinful state, are 
called in the scriptures, ''Children of the world," "Chil- 
dren of disobedience," "Children of the wicked one," and 
"Children of the devil." We are expressly told, Rom. 
9:8, "they which are the children of the flesh, these are 
not the children of God;" see Eph. 2:2, John 13:28 and 
John 3:10. 

It has often been asked, after depicting and caricatur- 
ing the horrors of the lost, "Are you not better than your 
God? Would you punish one of your children end- 
lessly?" This appeal to human sympathies is both de- 
ceptive and fallacious. It lies with all its weight against 
matter of fact, the present sufferings of the human race. 
God has seen and heard all the wails, agonies, tears and 
sorrows of six thousand years of human depravity and 
woe and He has almighty power, and yet he does not 



THE HOLINESS AND HAPPINESS OF ALL MEN I7I 

relieve matters. The world suffers on age after age 
and some think it is growing worse and worse. It is 
clearly seen that this popular argument, making blind 
human sympathy a rule by which to judge of God's 
moral government over wicked men, is most preposter- 
ous. 

Another plausible argument, often given as proof of 
the final holiness and happiness of all men, is the cor- 
rective nature and design of punishment. The argument 
is usually as follows: ''All divine punishment is de- 
signed to reform the sufferer; but endless punishment 
cannot reform the sufferer, therefore, no divine punish- 
ment can be endless/' It is said, 'The woes of sin are 
its antidote,'' and "if there be suffering in the next 
world, it is as in this, but the medicine of the sickly 
soul." 

In this, truth is adroitly mixed with error. All good 
men believe that "suffering comes from wrong doing, 
and well-being from virtue; but it does not therefore 
follow that the woes of sin are its antidote either in this 
world or in the next. If God designs to reform sinners 
by the woes of sin, He certainly fails in His object, as 
millions of men sin and suffer the woes of sin all their 
lives and grow worse until they die. The position that 
"the woes of sin are its antidote," is the same as say- 
ing that an effect will change or cure its cause, which 
is a philosophical blunder. 



iy2 SUNSET ECHOES 

The fallacy of this popular argument, is in the main 
position, which asserts that all punishment is designed 
to reform the sufferer. This position is not true. That 
God does sometimes correct with a view to the reforma- 
tion of the subject, we readily admit ; but such corrective 
dispensations are usually confined to them who are the 
people of God, in distinction from others, and are always 
limited to this life during which sinners are in a gracious 
state of probation. 

Because God corrects His children to render them 
more holy and useful, or because He punishes sinners 
during their day of gracious probation, to bring them to 
repentance, to infer from this that all punishment, un- 
der all circumstances, is designed to reform the sufferer, 
is a conclusion much broader than the premises from 
which it is drawn. It is a fact which all can see that 
the discipline which is a "savor of life unto life'' with 
some, is a "savor of death unto death'' with others. This 
is a distinctly revealed doctrine of the New Testament. 
"God knows how to deliver the godly out of temptation, 
and to reserve the unjust unto the day of judgment to be 
punished. 

While God desires all men to be holy and happy, some 
will not be because a compulsory holiness is impossible, 
some will not work out for themselves what cannot be 
wrought out for them, without their agency, even by 
Omnipotence. The divine expostulation to such is, "As 



THE HOLINESS AND HAPPINESS OF ALL MEN 173 

I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the 
death of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his 
way and live, turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways, for 
why will ye die." Ezek. 33:11. 

In view of this, our Savior declared, '^Ye will not 
come unto me that ye might have life/* God hates sin 
above all things. ''Oh do not this abominable thing 
which I hate.'' Sin is the ruinous thing in the universe 
and God forbids it, and is anxious to prevent it, and he 
does all His infinite wisdom and power can to prevent 
it. It cannot be shown that the Almighty could have 
done more than He has actually done to prevent sin and 
secure holiness without doing violence to the nature of 
man as a moral accountable being. 

Nor can be shown that the means and measures, both 
as to kind and degree, employed by God for the salva- 
tion and happiness of man from sin and misery, have 
not been precisely such as to secure the maximum of 
good and the minimum of evil. We vindicate the char- 
acter and power of God in the existence of sin and mis- 
ery in the world, on the ground that there is an inher- 
ent impossibility in excluding all evil from a moral uni- 
verse. It is a moral impossibility for God to do wrong. 
God cannot lie and He has said, 'The wicked shall be 
turned into hell and all the nations that forget God.'' 
If hell means the grave, we may add everybody else. 

God has the same power to annihilate a limited pun- 



1/4 SUNSET ECHOES 

ishment and hell, that He has to annihilate eternal pun- 
ishment and hell ; but this he does not see fit to do. Sin, 
sorrow and death have reigned in this world for nearly 
six thousand years. God has no more power to de- 
stroy sin and misery than He had to prevent them. If 
His power has slumbered over the horrible reign of sin 
and misery, over its sighs and groans and death during 
these long thousands of years, since He drove the guilty 
pair out of Paradise, no argument can be drawn from 
the power of God to prove that he will ever see it con- 
sistent to destroy sin and misery, or annihilate its wicked 
subjects. Of the finally impenitent He has said, 'These 
shall go away into everlasting punishment." 

Again it is said and argued that the holiness of God 
assures the final holiness and happiness of all men. It is 
said a holy God cannot perpetuate unholiness forever. 
This statement rests upon an assumed absurdity, i. e., if 
all men are not saved, a holy God perpetuates unholiness 
forever. If sin and misery cannot exist forever with- 
out being perpetuated by God, then they cannot exist for 
six thousand years without being perpetuated by Him 
for that time, and if a holy God can perpetuate sin and 
unholiness for six thousand years. His holiness cannot 
be incompatible with their eternal existence. The stu- 
pendous idea of eternity attaches to the whole of time 
as well as to a part, and so far as the holiness of God 



THE HOLINESS AND HAPPINESS OF ALL MEN I75 

determines anything, it will determine it in respect to 
a part of eternity, as well as to the whole of it. 

It is claimed that all men will finally become holy 
and happy, because of the Fatherhood of God. It is 
said God is the father of all men and that a good father, if 
he had the power, would not permit his children to 
suffer except for their good. God has the power and 
therefore will not permit suffering, except for the good 
of His offspring. This position is untrue in both of its 
parts. God does not act toward the family of man as a 
good, earthly parent would act toward his children, if 
he had the power, nor could he do so without a viola- 
tion of the principles of truth and righteousness. A 
good earthly parent, if he had the power, would not 
allow his child to become a thief, or a drunkard, or a 
blasphemer, or murderer; but God, having the power to 
prevent it (as claimed by some), does permit every de- 
gree of crime. A good earthly parent would not allow 
his children to suffer excruciating pain by fire, accident 
or poison, yet God permits these. A good earthly parent, 
if he had the power to prevent it, would not allow one 
child to wrong, oppress or murder another, nor would 
he allow his children to become insane, or to blaspheme 
the name of their father, or to injure his interests, yet 
God allows all these things among the human family. 

The providence of God, every day, is a practical re- 
futation of this argument. He is now doing, and has 



176 SUNSET ECHOES 

been ever since the fall of man, what no earthly parent 
would do, or would be allowed to do by any civil gov- 
ernment. What good- father would drown his whole fam- 
ily as God drowned the antediluvian world ? 

What father would burn his children as God burned 
the five cities of the plain, sending fire from heaven, con- 
suming men, women and children? What father would 
send serpents among his children, or open the ground and 
swallow them up, or kill them by the thousands by vol- 
canoes and earthquakes ? What father who could prevent 
it, would permit his children to starve and perish by mil- 
lions, as God has allowed whole nations to perish by fam- 
ine, plague and war? 

If God can drown, burn and destroy His children 
with famine, earthquakes and pestilence and death for 
so many thousand years, and still be a good father, as 
is claimed, how strong is the argument drawn from his 
loving fatherhood, in proof that He will never do what 
He declares he will do, "sever the wicked from the just, 
and cast them into the furnace of fire; there shall be 
wailing and gnashing of teeth/' Math. 13:47-50. 

The sympathies and feelings of our nature are often 
presented as a reason why all men will ultimately be- 
come holy and happy. If our short-sighted sympathies 
and feelings are a standard of truth, then we need neither 
reason nor revelation to help us to our creed in respect 
to the administration of the moral government of God. 



THE HOLINESS AND HAPPINESS OF ALL MEN 177 

That our feelings and sympathies are shocked at the 
Bible statements regarding the condition of the finally 
impenitent, we admit, and we infer from it that they 
are designed to prompt us "to flee from wrath to come" 
and not to teach us that there is no ''wrath to come." 
This looks consistent and natural. If we had nothing 
within us that would shudder at the idea of punishment, 
we would have no inducement to make our escape from 
it, and yet, because we shudder at the idea of endless 
punishment, some conclude that there can be no such 
thing. ''Such pervert the right ways of the Lord." 

The argument proves too much, it runs into absurdi- 
ties and contradicts matter of fact. It would disprove 
the justice of any punishment at all, to say nothing of 
God's providence towards guilty offenders in all ages. 
Our feelings revolt at the idea of God burning the Sod- 
omites for licentiousness, and striking dead Ananias and 
Sapphira for lying, and sending out fire from himself 
to consume two hundred and fifty men for offering him 
a mock service, and smiting with instant death the ten 
spies for unbelief, and punishing with a horrible death 
Achan and all his family for covetousness and doing 
the same with Korah, Dathan and Abiram, with their 
wives, sons and little children for rebellion, sending a 
plague to sweep away fourteen thousand of his people 
for murmuring against his servants, and directing Moses 
to slay three thousand men for dancing around a golden 



1/8 SUNSET ECHOES 

calf, and sending a destroying angel to kill twenty thou- 
sand Israelites for idolatry. 

The filial relations and tender ties that bind human- 
ity together are presented in proof that all men will finally 
become holy and happy. Appeals are often made to 
mothers and friends whether they could enjoy heaven, 
or would desire to go there if their loved ones are ex- 
cluded? Some even go so far as to say they have no 
wish to go to heaven if their friends are not saved. This 
popular appeal is more plausible than reasonable. 

It assumes as truth what experience denies ; the very 
persons who make it contradict the principle it involves, 
by not refusing wealth, honor or happiness because all 
their friends are not wealthy, honored or happy. This 
argument pushed to its logical results would 
prove that good men cannot enjoy the rewards of 
virtue because the disobedient are punished for their 
vice; that liberty cannot be enjoyed because the lawless 
are confined in prisons ; that life to the good can be no 
blessing because the felon is hung. Both experience and 
common sense refute such arguments to prove that all 
men will become holy and happy. 

We have noticed the strongest and most plau- 
sible positions taken to prove the final happiness 
of all men. If our replies to them are irrelevant, or 
illogical and fallacious, we shall be glad to know it. To 
ridicule and caricature endless punishment proves noth- 



THE HOLINESS AND HAPPINESS OF ALL MEN I79 

ing except the weakness and depravity of those who do 
It. Those who expect all will finally be saved, and base 
their hopes upon that, make their salvation to depend 
upon a disputed point ; disputed not only by the principal 
writers and commentators of every age, but by the mass 
of the whole Christian world. 

Those who neglect personal salvation and rely upon 
the ultimate salvation of all, hang their eternal salvation 
upon contested points, rejected by every evangelical 
church. If the churches are right and they are mistaken, 
their prospects are blasted in eternal night. All who live 
Christian lives are safe anyway; if there be no eternal 
hell, the believing there is one, cannot expose them to 
one. If there be no ''eternal damnation" they cannot be 
eternally damned. 'Their rock is not as our rock, our 
enemies themselves being judges.'' 



DEC 27 1904 



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